


Blood of Malice

by Moon_of_Valinor



Category: The Lord of the Rings (Movies), The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fantasy, No Slash, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-09-10 22:23:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 17
Words: 57,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8941735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moon_of_Valinor/pseuds/Moon_of_Valinor
Summary: Rated PG/PG-13 for angst and suicidal thoughts; no profanity, I promise. :) Seville, a creature not meant to exist, is cast out of her world on behalf of the only family she has ever known. She arrives in Hobbiton with the intent to waste away . . . until she meets Frodo Baggins. After becoming his closest companion, she journeys with him to destroy the One Ring. This is a rather early draft, published on FF and Wattpad, and will be edited soon.





	1. Prologue - Creation Failure

**Author's Note:**

> This story will not start in a location or with characters you recognize, and if you want to just jump right to Middle Earth, that will come in right around Chapter 3 or so. I will be editing all of my stories in the future (all of them Frodo romances, except for a pair of canon pieces), so I appreciate comments, especially if you let me know as articulately and diplomatically as possible what I ought to change to make the story better. And if you send me a message, I will be sure to come and check out your stories, for constructive criticism or praise if you just need a pick-me-up.  
> Thanks!  
> -Moon of Valinor

Willation’s fingers flitted around the Alchemic counter, drawing one powder or pigment after another. They combined in his hands to create a living, pulsing gelatin. His heart raced; he couldn’t work fast enough as his fingers carefully molded a living creature, a human of sorts. Every inch of the thing revealed itself moment after moment, while he worked from its feet up. The gelatin hardened into empty flesh even as he worked, quickly creating a mold from which to work.  
This would have to be right. Sheratan lay dying, and they didn’t have time.  
He nodded, forced to be satisfied with the full-grown creature at its height of three and a half feet. He collapsed the structure in his arms, carrying it back into the dungeon cell where Sheratan lay, convulsing. Powerful, black poison throbbed through her system, eating away at her heart even as she lay down. As he grabbed her hand, he watched the sword from only thirty minutes before, saw it flicker. He had expected to die, but she leaped in the way. He shook his head, tears pricking at his eyes. He couldn’t lose her, not now. Alshain had killed himself. Willation almost wanted to think the latter a miracle, but Alshain could have healed her. He had, after all, fashioned the poison to kill anyone.  
Now this would be their last chance.  
Sheratan’s long, red hair lay in tangles across her face and heaving lungs. She could see nothing, and sharp pain throbbed through her system, eating away at the cells within her. The world blurred; she almost anticipated dying, relative to this horror.  
There had been no signs of blood, but a great, gaping gash claimed passage through her entire torso. The moment bleeding begun Willation would know he’d lost her. He rushed the gelatin mass to her side, then grabbed her fingers desperately. Her skin began to deteriorate, decaying into a frail sheet of gray. He threw his energy and his prayers to the Great Creator into his own fingers, and felt the healing pull at him. The poison coalesced in a black pool at his fingertips, and Sheratan writhed in pain. Only a heart-wrenching moan escaped her, and her eyes slacked back. Willation had never known her to scream before, and hoped now would not be the time such a circumstance changed. He’d never forget the chill of her voice in terrified agony beating against his ears.  
Her emotions bared themselves in a simple cry as the gelatin in Willation’s arms fleshed out. The black poison created a visible bloodstream until the skin began to layer itself, thickening. As Willation wrapped her in his cloak, features formed on the girl’s face, and her flesh grew more opaque as semi-mortal form overtook her. Her nose and mouth, as well as the curves of her eyes, grew alike to Sheratan’s. Thick, bushy hair sprouted in curls over the top of her head and grew down.  
Only when her eyes flashed open did color begin to appear. Her lips were inky black, and her murky blue irises contrasted black blood in her eyes. Her hair grew dark red, a little more maroon than Sheratan’s. A dark dot also faded into view on her left cheek, a mark of distinction. She would fit nowhere.  
Sheratan finally felt the pain deteriorate; it had gone, but she knew it had to go somewhere. She turned her head, spotting a girl nearby. She furrowed her brow as she took in the details, what had happened as she watched black blood forge paths through the girl’s system. Almost immediately a name came to mind. “Seville,” she said weakly.  
Willation’s head snapped up.  
Sheratan tossed her head at the girl, but the action stunned her, so she didn’t move further. She moaned and laid back against the bed, trying to keep it subtle enough not to let Willation know. “She will live, won’t she?”  
He nodded, gently lifting the limp form up from the ground. The girl’s eyes slacked back; he didn’t know how long it would take for life to really come to her. She had no soul. Her life would be a false one, and her own existence created friction with the world. She would be too dangerous to live for very long.  
“She won’t last much time,” Willation said carefully, laying her down in Sheratan’s lap. The latter sat up abruptly, reverently holding the girl in her arms. The girl’s face looked nigh identical to her own; she even had the dark mark on her cheek, in the exact same place.  
Sheratan surveyed her. “We still ought to name her.”  
“Hence Seville,” Willation prompted. He paused as he considered the name.  
“Blood of malice,” they said nigh simultaneously. Willation looked up at Sheratan and realized how accurate the name would be as the girl’s life played out. The name, while sinister and feared among Lavwuns, would not be a detriment: Seville could never fit in with the outside world. If ever she were accepted by anyone outside of her creators, it would be too miraculous . . . until the moment she became dangerous to everyone around her.  
Willation knelt down next to the bed. He knew what he had done. He had given life to something not meant to live. Not only did Seville defy the laws of the universe themselves, but the very blood in her veins sizzled with the desire to destroy, to be rid of itself in some way. Seville would fight the world and her own existence for the rest of her life.  
After life she could go nowhere. Everything about her would be pain.  
Willation didn’t realize his face had soaked with tears until Sheratan’s expression grew concerned, and she sat up. “Willation?” Her fingers graced his cheek, absorbing the tears there.  
She feared what he would say. He didn’t look too overjoyed, although he had just committed a monumental act. Apparently there were huge downsides.  
He brought her hand down, holding it with both of his own. He swallowed before he launched into explanation, about how Seville couldn’t truly live. How she would never die, but would decay upon losing the last of her blood, as it appeared to deteriorate little by little to rid life of itself. How every day she experienced would be pain, friction with existence and friction with herself. He could think of nothing to help. He could not heal her, for as a creature—or an anti-creature, he realized described her better—she relatively stood perfectly healthy.  
Even as Willation related all of these horrible things, he realized he would have done it had he analyzed before what would happen and knew the consequences. He glanced up at Sheratan. He pulled Seville from her arms and laid her very carefully aside. The pale skin had not gone away; yet another freakish aspect to a permanent misfit.  
Sheratan realized the dynamic of what she had done, of what Willation had been forced to do because she leaped in the way of Alshain’s sword. But as she studied his deep, brown eyes and the tears held within them she knew she would never have let him die, even if she had known about Seville before.  
Willation took Sheratan in his arms, sighing a little as he drove the consequences of creating Seville against the consequences of not, and he felt somewhat comforted.  
“I would have lost you if she didn’t exist,” he said, and Sheratan buried her face in his shoulder. Then he felt a moment of peace, of the Great Creator trying to tell him something. He pulled Sheratan closer. “She will be all right.”  
Sheratan nodded against his shoulder. “I certainly hope so.” He hadn’t expected her to believe him, but she sounded a little hopeful if anything, but she knew he would never lie. She believed what he said, although she didn’t know how hard it would be.  
“We’ll raise her?” he asked. He meant more of an assurance, but he didn’t want to force it on her. Willation would have to be gone the majority of the time; Sheratan would be raising Seville herself. “You will, I suppose. But I will teach her to fight, help you when you’re tired.”  
Sheratan sighed and embraced him back. She actually looked forward to it, raising an anti-creature, or raising anything, with Willation’s help. She loved him enough.  
“Of course we will.” Then she glanced up. “The poison. Alshain. Could she heal him too?”  
Willation paused, and he squeezed her. “Yes,” he said. “Don’t worry. We’ll take her back to the capital. He will not come back.”  
Sheratan didn’t want to trust him, but knew anyone who didn’t believe him usually ended up wrong. “Is it all right if we come here every year just to make sure?” Then she paused. “And to be alone? Just for a few minutes? Verusia insisted we never let any Tronians find out, so chances are excellent we will have to be careful at home.”  
He nodded, and she laid her head down on his shoulder. “Of course,” he said. Admittedly he did want to have a moment once in a while to express his feelings and to hear hers; perhaps someday it would be safe for him to marry her. He closed his eyes as he thought about it. He had only kissed her once. He couldn’t imagine doing it for the rest of his life.  
Sheratan could feel him shifting. She wondered what he thought, why he tensed so every moment he walked by her side on the way down the mountain.


	2. Dark Birthday

Seville woke up on her “birthday” for the 32nd time, and didn’t anticipate it. For years Willation and Sheratan, her only company in the world, had vanished every anniversary of her birth. 33 years ago this day, she had come into existence, and no one would be there—again—to let her know they cared. Of course, she only expected such; no one had time for her. She wondered for a moment why life mattered to anyone if everyone lived like this.  
The sun glared through her cave window, shining right in her eyes. She winced, and her eyes slammed shut. She backed away, scooted across the rock until the vicious light departed. She could feel the blood rushing to her face, combating the awful sting. Her eyes watered as she slipped the lids back over them; she leaned back against the stone.  
Another day alone. Another day of pain, of an indescribable burning against her skin every waking moment and an excruciating pulse of fire while she slept.  
But she had grown used to it.  
Somehow it still felt wrong.

Willation and Sheratan should have come back at midnight, but they did not return. Seville waited for months, watched at the cave mouth for them to come back. But no sign of a black dragon in the distant fog below their mountain. She heard nothing, she saw nothing. She needed no rest or food for sustenance, but slept and ate often regardless. She had little more to do with her time, besides read and write like she loved to do. But even so she grew restless; she grew worried.  
Finally, two months and five days of counting later, she peered over the side of the mountain and decided she would find them first, as they had not come back for so long. She had sent letters via Willation’s falcons to the Lavwun Palace nearby, but all replies—to the Guard and the royalty—were negative on sightings of Willation or Sheratan. Seville spun around, heading for the back of the cave. A shiny, mahogany shelf stacked with leather books and folded maps lay against the wall. She shuffled through the bottom rack until she located a map titled “Anniversary.” She saw the date below the title: her birthday, 33 years before.  
Seville unfolded the golden, crusty paper and laid it out on the hard stone floor. “Anniversary” and the subsequent date both bled onto the page in inky calligraphy on the exterior of the map, making a mark on the inside in the scattered reverse of what had been written. Seville perused the black markings, finally locating a dotted line tracing their mountain—Atansdorre—down the side, to a universal trail, and out to Mount Demonsdorre, twelve planets away.  
As Seville gathered a light bit of food, her cloak, and a dagger, she wondered exactly what ‘universal trail’ meant. Willation had spoken of them. They allowed one the capability to travel through empty space unhindered by distance or lack of speed . . . or lack of air to breathe. But Seville had no idea how they worked, and so gathered she would find out.  
The climb down the mountain surprised her for its ease. Apparently she had not been taken too high up, for she only had to get hand and footholds down the mountain for ten minutes or so. She had never attempted to climb down, but somehow she did not fear falling. However many books she read about fear of heights and dying from tumbling through the air off of a mountain, she couldn’t feel it.  
She leaped off to the base, glancing around in the foggy air. The clouds departed for a short moment, and she could see green life everywhere she turned. She walked distractedly among the trees and grass; she’d never seen so much color, even on her bookshelf. Her eyes lit up with dazzled enchantment when she saw flowers, particularly the blue ones. The blue ones looked like ice, cold and somehow inviting in a way. She peered at them, unsure why they caught her attention so thoroughly. The water as well; once she saw it she could not tear her gaze from the trickling stream nearby until she realized she had come down from Atansdorre for a reason.  
Apparently the map had exaggerated what Seville had considered to be a long distance, for she only had to walk three or four miles before she felt a cold fizzle above her head. She halted abruptly and stepped back, feeling again for the fizzle. She pulled out the map, eyeing the universal trail mark. A small star lay drawn above the mark, and she glanced down to where the star had been replicated at the bottom of the map.  
It said “Achnithe: verille sothai” . . . and nothing more.  
Seville cocked her head, thinking back to when she had learned Ancient languages. “Enter: open finger.” It made little sense, but touching the cold trail entrance—assuming she could find it—seemed worth a shot. She glanced into the air, then reached out with one hand. Her fingers graced a frozen, metal sheet she could not see, but soon a loud creaking and grating split the air, and it seemed the very fabric of the sky opened up right in front of her into a gaping, black hole. When she peered inside, she could see shimmering stars dotting the emptiness before her.  
She grabbed the sides of the holes and launched herself inside. A sucking sound grew around her ears, and she zipped through the whirring blackness of space. She glanced around, a little shocked as some unseen force hurled her through the tunnel. She could see stars shooting by, and caught none of them on an individual level.  
The cold air seemed to grab her with careful fingers and set her down on the ground very gently. The black shaft behind her slipped closed, and the air about her warmed relative to being in space. She adjusted her pack over her shoulders, glancing around. With how little time it took to get from Atansdorre to the universal trail, Demonsdorre couldn’t be too far away from where the tunnel had set her down. Mostly a forest of thick conifers surrounded her, but finally she spotted a blood-red mountain peak breaching the top of the woods.  
Seville sighed. She had almost been hoping it would be a dangerous journey, simply because she felt like pain in life required some major reason to be existent, so adventuring appealed to her. Besides, she had read so many and had truly lived none in the way of journeys. The dagger at her side would apparently do nothing to help her, since she needed no help. With the lack of adventure having slammed into her, she adjusted her pack and began walking.  
Her walking through the silent woods soon slowed, then became trudging after some time. Demonsdorre had not gotten much closer. Apparently the mountain stood taller than Seville had realized. She walked for only an hour at the most brisk pace she could manage, primarily going uphill, before her breathing grew labored and her legs burned. She easily ran out of water, although it didn’t help much to have it anyway. Her world spun, and she sank to her knees, eyes dotting with black spots. She’d never gone so far before, not without wings.  
Finally she saw a loose, thick branch ready to come off of a barren tree. She stepped toward it, grabbed it with both hands, and wrenched back with her full body, but the branch did not come loose. She strained against it, scrambling back with her heels in the ground. She bit her lip when her foot nearly shot out of her shoe, slamming her toes against it. She stood on her good leg for a moment, inhaling and exhaling as methodically as she could to quell the pain. Her feet had been growing, and nothing else, for the past few days, and she couldn’t understand it. But she didn’t want to discard her shoes, not now. She glanced down; her toes peeked through both shoes, and she could feel friction building across her feet.  
Exhausted, she gave a final jerk to the branch, and it cracked loose. She stumbled back with the sudden lack of resistance, but she got back on her feet and, using the stick as a staff, began walking again towards Demonsdorre.  
Soon she found a second branch—one she cracked off by batting it with her first one—and began vaulting herself forward on both sticks. She used them as crutches, and therefore only walked with one foot at a time in about half hour increments. Soon the forest ended, revealing a flat field of blood-red granite between her and the mountain. She didn’t anticipate the ascent up Demonsdorre, assuming it happened to be as tall as it appeared.  
The plain, now level as opposed to sloping upward, actually made her journey easier. But then Seville realized perhaps this venture would be dangerous. With the empty field, the looming mountain, and no food, water, or supplies, she could feel adrenalized apprehension creeping up on her shoulder. She glanced around, waiting for something dangerous to strike at her. By the time she snapped out of envisioning swordfights and dragons surrounding her every move, the sun had nearly set, casting an eerie, dark glow across the mountain before her. She halted abruptly when she realized she had come right to the base of the Draconic Mountain Range.  
Then she heard something . . . a skittering of pebbles on the rocks. She looked up, and saw Willation, a black shape on the side of the mountain, some eight hundred feet beyond, very close to her. He held a sobbing Sheratan in his arms, and his hand stroked her hair carefully.  
Seville excitedly stepped forward to call out to them, only for a sharp pain to stab at her heart. She stepped back to look at it; the pain spread like lightning through her system, along her blood veins snapping from her heart to her fingers and back. Ice and fire crunched her bones, crushed her arm. She grabbed for her pained arm—the left one—and collapsed to the ground.

On Seville’s birthday . . .  
“Seville must go,” Willation insisted. His voice, though quiet, rang through Alshain’s red granite palace like a funeral bell. Sheratan nodded somewhat distantly, slacking against the wall. Willation didn’t know how to comfort her, and simply elaborated on the situation: “These impulses you’ve been feeling to bring her here are nothing more than the poison having been in your system trying to bring Alshain back to life.”  
Sheratan didn’t seem to mind his last statement. She stared at the floor. “Where will she go?”  
Willation shook his head. “I have some options, but you won’t like any of them.”  
Sheratan’s eyes squeezed shut.  
“We have a family of dragons requiring a huntress in the North Caractocs—,” Willation halted when he saw her slump to the floor. “We can’t send her to a human family, Sheratan,” he said gently. “She won’t be accepted, and she won’t survive.”  
“I know,” Sheratan muttered against the floor. “Isn’t there any other way?”  
Willation opened his mouth to speak again . . . but then he realized he could feel, somewhere within, the drops of her tears hitting the ground. He slid across the floor to her and brought her into his arms. She didn’t move more than a heaved sigh.  
“What about the case you told me about . . . the one where you couldn’t go help because it’s beyond us?”  
Willation paused. “Frodo Baggins? He’s already to the Undying Lands, Sheratan.” Then he froze. “A time transition?”  
Finally, Sheratan thought. Of course a time transition. She remembered reading Frodo’s story eight years before when Willation had brought it home following the disappearance of Samwise Gamgee. And she loved every minute of it, until she realized Frodo had been alone the entire time. Perhaps Seville could help, if nothing else.  
Sheratan shrugged within Willation’s grip, but he could feel hope rising within her despite what would seem an ambivalent movement. “Why not? If it works—if you could truly turn back time on Middle Earth without it here—it would be optimal. She’s about the size of a hobbit, yes?”  
Willation nodded. “Sheratan, you’re a genius.”  
She smiled, and her face heated. “Thanks.”  
The process dragged on for almost two and a half months. Sheratan worried about Seville, but with all of the alchemical material Willation endangered himself around, she didn’t dare leave him.  
He apologized for the wait as his chemicals simmered and sparked in a small makeshift pot he had put together using bits of stone from around Alshain’s palace. Sheratan could feel the familiar suction as time—somewhere in the universe—shifted back. It erased pain, it stole memories and good times . . . it ruined some and blessed others.  
Willation nodded affirmatively and extended a hand to Sheratan. “It’s time to get her.”  
While they continued climbing down the mountain, however, Sheratan still felt the little sore spot in her heart where she would break when Seville left, despite the two months of assisting in letting her go. She had grown attached to the young girl, even if the poison made it impossible for Seville to love without complete commitment. Sheratan had never had the ability to connect with Seville, but some young man would. And she wondered if it would be Frodo, who probably needed it.  
She didn’t want to lose her, though. When interacting with people, Seville could be remarkably sarcastic and a little bit pleasant in the attempt to be tolerant of everyone, but she did happen to be rather closed as a person. She refused to tell Sheratan very much about her life, aside from a periodical question about whether life should hurt.  
She worried about Seville.  
Apparently she worried more than she realized. Willation noticed, when they had nearly reached the base of the mountain, tears streaming down her face. He didn’t need to ask her why she cried; he already knew. He had spoken to Seville also, and if he knew of a way to keep her with them he would have leaped on the chance.  
He held Sheratan, trying to console her. Words would not help, he knew; she would only need time. So he gave her time, although he knew she wanted to get back to Seville. And he felt getting her as far away as fast as possible would help Sheratan with her impulses to be near Alshain, near his corpse at the base of the mountain.  
Sheratan simply buried her face in his shoulder, letting the tears stream down her face and into his cloak. She only needed to get it out once; the day Seville would be gone, in probably three days or so after they explained what would happen and had given her time to adjust, Sheratan intended not to have any emotions flood her or the people around her.  
Then she heard a desperate, agonized cry, and her head snapped up.  
Willation leaped from her side, dashing down the rest of the mountain. Seville lay at the base, rolling in jerks and shoves towards the bush where Alshain’s body had been concealed. Her teeth were ground together, and she yanked against the pull on her. He could see her blood pulsing beyond her epidermis level, trying to reach Alshain, finish its purpose and be done.  
He grabbed her hand, and the blackness immediately began to draw back to his fingertips. He grouped his fingers together; the darkness followed him, and he pulled it up her arm, across her shoulder, and to her heart. She immediately began to slow in her convulsions. Soon consciousness came back to her, and her eyes flickered open.  
Sheratan leaped down after Willation and knelt by Seville’s side. “Seville, are you all right?” she asked.  
Seville just shivered, trying to nod. She had never felt such pain. When Sheratan cocked her head, Seville still didn’t feel as though she had the strength to respond in words, and so simply turned to Willation. “What was that?”  
He buried his face in his hand, and Seville’s eyebrows drew together. He glanced up at Sheratan, then at Seville, before launching into explanation.  
“You are 33,” he began.  
Seville already knew this, but assumed he had a good reason for starting at such an obvious point. She nodded at him, expecting him to continue. She realized it probably wouldn’t be easy for him to explain; probably on some level it would be difficult.  
“Such is the coming of age of the species to which we are going to send you,” he said.  
At last something she did not know revealed. Seville frowned, and one of her eyebrows cocked. “Why?”  
“Why their coming of age is 33, because most hobbits tend to mature around age 33.” Back to what would be easily deduced. She remained patient. “Why I am sending you, because of this.” Willation reached under a nearby bush, and out with his hand came the head of Alshain. Sheratan inhaled sharply; Seville began to convulse again, and the horrible pain spread throughout her arm, threatening to take her heart.  
Willation grabbed Seville’s hand and shoved Alshain back under the bush where he had lain, frozen in death, for 33 years. Seville felt the force dragging her towards Alshain; she felt the pain fade away until it had no sway on her. At least, not for now. Then she realized, as she considered it, how the pain felt so familiar. The pain she lived with every day, magnified thousands of times until she knew to try and tolerate it every day would be impossible.  
“Seville,” Willation said. She glanced up, terrified. He inhaled slowly, then breathed out. “This pain you feel is your conflict with life itself.” He let a finger to his arm, which he pricked with a claw. Brown liquid trickled onto his finger, and he held it out for her to see. She held out her hand to touch it, and blackness condensed, pulsing, to her fingers. She shrank away. She did not feel pain, but she felt a pull, a thirst to make herself stronger.  
“You have no parents,” he said slowly. “I created you to save Sheratan’s life; Alshain poisoned her with a substance not meant to exist. What he did, I am unsure. I made you to contain it, and now you are the one thing in the universe capable of healing him, bringing him to life again.” He sighed. “I am afraid, Seville, the factor of your blood itself makes the world to fight you and your existence. You are an anti-creature, and you feel the pain of your protection of the Author, and the one I—,” He swallowed, shaking his head. “You protect the Author, and you can heal anyone. Your sustenance requires no food, water, or chemical, but the ability to drain the injuries from others. But be careful, for to become addicted to wounds is to become addicted to wounding.”  
Seville sank to the ground. No parents. An anti-creature. Friction with the universe.  
“Is there more?” she said, monotone. Sheratan winced behind her.  
“Yes,” Willation said. “Your blood drains when you do not drain the wound from another. You will deteriorate soon if you leave yourself not to find sustenance.” He closed his eyes. “And you have no real soul, Seville. You will not die: you will simply cease to exist.”  
Seville blinked, unsure how to take it all in. At first, she felt shock simply hearing this truth in words . . . but it felt right. In a sickening, horrifying, awful way it felt perfectly right.  
“Your name,” he said, “means Blood of Darkness. Or Essence of Darkness.”  
Seville’s eyes slipped closed. “Sev . . . essence or life-force, commonly considered blood in modern translation. –ille, suffix consisting of or denoting—,” She coughed. “. . . evil, blackness, or malice.”  
Willation nodded when her eyes swelled back open.  
“Why did you never tell me?” she asked. She did not wish to sound upset; admittedly she had almost been expecting this. So she bit back all of her questions. They would do no good now.  
Sheratan stepped in then. “You weren’t ready,” she said. “As a child it would have been impossible to cope, or so I assume. Perhaps I’m wrong.” Then she sat down next to Seville, who just fleetingly glanced at her, but then remained looking at her, hoping she would explain. “And your maturity has always been impossible to track. We have no idea how your age equivocates to ours, much less the hobbits’.” She paused. “It would be easy to say you will never physically change. You’ve looked fully aged—perhaps twenty thousand years or so—since Willation created you. Perhaps you shall never age.”  
“There certainly would be no point,” Seville conceded, somewhat bitterly. She turned back to Willation. “When do I leave?”  
The bitterness struck a chord in Sheratan’s heart, for tears began to streak down her face again. This time Willation and Seville both took to comforting her, Seville only because she realized how much she would miss her caretakers, everything she had ever known, even if life had always been so painful.  
Seville had expected the travel home to be eerily silent. But Willation and Sheratan planned when and how the transaction of getting her to the hobbits would take place as they flew side by side, both dragons. Seville rode on Sheratan’s back, feeling a little remorse at not becoming closer to her, but not willing to take it back now. While they debated over a day to have it done, Seville finally spoke up.  
“Tomorrow?”  
Willation and Sheratan both fell silent.  
“I don’t want to prolong my dissipation any more than is necessary,” Seville elaborated. “And the sooner I’m gone, the sooner you can move on with your lives.”  
Sheratan swallowed, and Seville patted her scaly neck. “Don’t worry about me,” Seville insisted. “It’ll only hurt more that way. Besides, I don’t need to be worried about. I’ll be just fine.”  
Sheratan’s eyes closed, and she glanced away. Seville turned to Willation, who looked somewhat downtrodden as well.  
“Come on, you two!” Seville insisted, sitting upright. “Look; you’re both still alive, Alshain is still dead, and you can get back to life now! I don’t understand why this is a sad thing. Besides, maybe I’ll enjoy Middle Earth.”  
“You don’t intend to,” Willation pointed out carefully.  
Seville lifted an eyebrow. “Of course not. You’ve just told me I’ll either get addicted to life or waste away protecting everybody else. So basically I have no room to be optimistic, but you two do.”  
By this time they had reached the universal trail, and Willation opened it with a simple rumble of his throat. The doors creaked open in front of them, and even before they were fully apart Sheratan and Willation shot through, and the cold claimed Seville again. She actually thought it soothing, touching something colder than herself, something to quell her friction with life itself.  
She realized, as they approached Atansdorre, just how alone she had always felt, how alone she would always feel, even if she did try to fit in on Middle Earth. Perhaps she would try, and then give up after a few generations of people with no luck in finding a companion. She knew a companion would be possible for mortals if not for herself; she understood the secrets of affection. She had watched Willation kiss Sheratan, if only twice. She slumped against Sheratan’s neck and wondered if she could ever have one love her so much, and be capable of reciprocating such love.  
What did love feel like, anyway?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now, I haven't even tried to revise this for some time, and I've done a lot of writing and hopefully a lot of improving between then and now, but the story itself apparently gets better, because it's my most popular story on FF.


	3. Frodo and Sam

Seville did not sleep. Sheratan didn’t either while Willation departed their mountain to fix the way for Seville to approach a forbidden world, where Lavwuns never went. Seville asked Sheratan questions, grew to know who she had been living with this entire time: she learned of Alshain, of how Sheratan had felt like a mother to Seville.  
By morning, when Willation returned, all were in a dismal state. Seville, for the first time in her life, embraced Sheratan, somewhat afraid to leave. She had not grown to love her yet, but felt she could have.  
“I love you, Seville,” Sheratan said, her voice muffled in Seville’s shoulder. “Be careful.”  
Seville nodded. “I will do my best.”  
Willation extended a hand, and Seville departed Sheratan to take it. Willation had a pack in his other hand, and he gave it to Seville, who slipped it over her shoulders. Then he began shifting into a dragon and stepped outside of the cave to let Seville mount him. Sheratan approached them, clasping her tunic over her heart.  
“I’ll be back in a short while,” Willation said, nodding to Sheratan. She nodded just as formally back, but Seville caught the moment of care between them. Then he turned, leaping into the air.  
Soon Seville could only see sky around them. Another universal trail opened up at the top of the sky, and Willation accelerated to shoot through it. The cold of empty space met Seville’s skin, and she breathed slowly, allowing the chill to sink in. It lasted far longer than when they had gone between Atansdorre and Demonsdorre; Seville suddenly realized how far away from Sheratan she would be, and how realistic her assumption—never seeing Sheratan again—had been.  
She wondered if Willation could feel her spirits sink, because he turned his head slightly.  
“I know it seems such now,” he said, “but give life a shot. Things might become better.”  
“You didn’t sound too hopeful back there,” Seville said doubtfully.  
He shrugged, and she nearly fell off his shoulders. “It isn’t courteous to be optimistic when speaking about a girl’s dark past, and prospect for a dark future. But Seville, I’m taking you to Middle Earth to give you a chance for change. I have but one certain warning for you, if you decide to stay alive.”  
Seville didn’t dare meet his eyes for a few moments for fear of what he would say. She didn’t look at him before he landed, though, in a thin, kindly forest of spring green. Seville perked up when she heard the trickle of water nearby, and could see rolling hills across the entire distance.  
Then she turned back to Willation, who let her off of his shoulders and transitioned back into a humanoid form. He stepped forward and embraced her, which surprised her. She felt a little tingle as she realized she probably would have grown to love him too. If she’d ever had parents it would have been him and Sheratan; for once she didn’t want to let them go, if only to have a chance to learn more, finally get out of herself.  
When he backed away, he laid a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t fall in love if he can’t help you.”  
Seville’s eyebrow strained not to cock. She nodded, although she had no idea why he would say anything of the sort. “I promise I will do my best.”  
He pecked her forehead, which only let her regret sink deeper for not accepting him as a father figure. With a final, wistful wave, Willation turned away and vanished.  
Left in this beautiful place, Seville had no idea where to turn. In spite of Willation’s last, hopeful statement she felt nothing long-term and hopeful here. The bright sun carved into her eyes, although the morning had only just begun, allowing her to keep her back to the light and not feel nearly as much pain.  
She inhaled and exhaled slowly. She could feel the sweet air rise through her nose, fill her lungs. But she sank into somewhat of a hunched slouch when she realized the very oxygen she breathed wished her gone. Rejection of existence itself in mind, she didn’t feel this experience had begun very well. Immediately she thought of going home.  
“What difference would it make?” she muttered. “No one wants you there either, except for the two people not able to care anymore.”  
With the conviction to die set in her mind, she found a log to hide beneath. She realized said log covered a crevice in the ground, roughly five feet long, a little under three and a half feet deep, and two feet across. She whistled at the size of the thick log, probably the remnants of an extremely old tree root dug up from the hole below.  
Seville slipped under the log, into the hole, and immediately began packing the loose sides into corners, hoping to be as comfortable as possible while she laid down to die. She stood and decided to walk around, pick up on the nearby life, while she waited for her blood to drain.  
But moments after she got out from under the dark log, she heard a voice, and her back grew rigid.  
“Frodo! Frodo, where are you?”  
Seville hissed, initially frightened, and rolled back under the log, thudding against the ground floor with her need to get down. She peered up over the ground and spotted a young, dirt-covered boy with orange hair sprinting across the grass towards her. She cocked her head, caught off guard by his height. No one, not even the children of Lavwu, were her size. Usually they grew taller were they in a few hundred years of age. But this one looked young, adolescent, possibly a little younger.  
“Frodo!” he called out.  
“I’m over here, Sam.”  
The new voice—behind Seville—shocked her into slowly turning around. A pair of ice blue eyes stared back at her own. They matched the younger, gentler voice she had heard relative to “Sam”, if the name indeed applied to the orange-haired one. Seville hesitated, shaking her head to clear the muddle building within it. She got a good look at the rest of him: he held a book in his hands, large but gentle hands. Generally the boy seemed rather slender relative to the other. He had dark, curly hair grown almost to his shoulders, as well as huge feet and Elvish ears.  
Seville blinked. Having only ever seen men significantly older than herself, it struck her as odd to suddenly be attracted to another being. She shook her head, surveying those eyes. Those eyes . . . blue like the flowers back home. Only these were alive. Unburdened, not yet pained. Very beautiful eyes.  
She shook her head, trying to vault the ridiculous notion out of her mind. Frodo, Sam had called him.

Frodo didn’t entirely know what to think. Sam had called him, and he knew it probably had something to do with Rosie Cotton: “Frodo! Frodo, where are you?” But he gathered Sam wouldn’t hear his response from so far away, and so he kept reading the book in his hands. The blade of grass in his mouth twisted at the climax. As he had forgotten, a kissing scene lay sandwiched between exciting moments; his eyes skimmed past it. He did not care for them. They served little purpose to the story.  
Finally Frodo could see Sam approaching in his peripheral vision, and he glanced up to see Sam bounding over the grass, ready to leap over a huge log in the ground. But even as Frodo turned to watch, a movement beneath the log caught his eye. He cocked his head, staring a little as his vision adjusted to the shadows. Soon another movement flickered, and Frodo looked back to see a pair of curious, dangerous eyes staring back at him.  
He blinked uncertainly, setting the book aside. Just then Sam approached, looking one direction to another for Frodo. “Frodo!”  
Frodo tore his eyes from the strange sight under the log only for a second. “I’m over here, Sam.” He set down the blade of grass as well, peering back at what he had seen. Soon he could see the face of a girl watching him. His eyes widened slightly, but he turned away when Sam spotted him and approached.  
Seville recoiled when Sam’s feet appeared in front of her log, as he had just leaped over. But the sight of this Frodo intrigued her enough, so she did not bury herself in the ground.  
“Frodo, I’ve finished the flowers!” he exclaimed, racing towards the other boy. “I thought you might want to come and see.”  
As Frodo had assumed, this had everything to do with Rosie and nothing at all to do with the actual state of the Baggins yard. He smiled at Sam regardless, then stood and walked with him . . . close to the log on the way back to the main paths of West Farthing. The girl’s gaze followed them; she looked as though she could and would bite if either got too close. And she seemed afraid they would bite too.  
Seville glared at them as they neared. Frodo’s smile seemed too much, just as no one had ever really smiled at her before, particularly not a stranger. She didn’t understand what he could see in her, and she didn’t feel ready to jump into some random hobbit. Willation had called them hobbits; she wondered how old Frodo and Sam were, if they had reached 33. They didn’t look adult, not quite yet.  
When Frodo and Sam were a short distance away, Seville leaped out from beneath the log and rolled over to where Frodo had abandoned his book. Something familiar at last. She didn’t need to flip to the earliest page; she knew this novel, likely the contents of which extracted from this world to be added to the Lavwun library. She flipped through the first few pages, fascinated and ecstatic to see a little bit of home. If she could ever call anywhere or anyone home.  
Frodo couldn’t help but look back, and he noticed her nose excitedly buried in his book. He cocked his head. Most hobbits didn’t read, and certainly no hobbits to his knowledge would be so hungry about a book. She interested him. He noticed her hair, long and bushy as it cascaded off of her head.  
She interested him.  
She turned, spotting him, and her eyes narrowed, as though daring him to come back and claim the book. He had no intention of doing so, particularly when he thought he heard a growl from her. So he abandoned the idea of watching her further, deciding simply to follow Sam back to Bag End. Frodo shivered, realizing her eyes—even from a distance—seemed to bear black veins.  
Seville finished the book before Frodo returned, and she put it back in its place. He didn’t come back that day. Once she set it down under the tree and retreated to her log she sighed. She just wanted to die now.  
But what of Frodo? Would anything come of it? She pondered it for a moment. Perhaps she could stay live just to watch him for a little while until she realized he wouldn’t be worth her time. Then she could explore the rest of the Shire and be done with it all.  
Seville slept under her log, but she didn’t get much rest. Mostly she thought about Frodo. She’d never found anyone attractive before, and she wondered what this meant. His eyes, she thought. The eyes made it all. He had nothing to worry about, or so it seemed. She would find out what life she had to live to have that light in her own eyes, in her own mind forever.  
A quest. Perfect reason to live and be curious.


	4. "Come Out!"

Her mind raced as she planned the entire next day, and before she knew it the sun had cracked over the distant horizon. She squinted at it, not ready for the sun to be up. Sunlight hurt.   
Regardless Seville suddenly wondered what hobbits were like, what the Shire had to be like. She sprang up from the ground and, after checking around her to make sure no one could see her climb out, she leaped into the nearby forest, slinking along the shadows to learn what she could.  
She saw homes, and hobbits. Mostly they seemed like harmless, rotund, somewhat unintelligent creatures. They fascinated her as she watched them plant, eat, and care rather carefreely for each other. She hoped she could adapt to them as well as she had the concept of Frodo; he couldn’t be the only one of his sort.  
Seville spent half the day among them, and learned a great deal, or so she thought. But when the sun claimed the sky she roamed the forest, again slinking about. She didn’t mind being spotted there; she felt dangerous, prowling about like a predator. No one would approach her then.  
Although she imagined befriending Frodo. She’d never befriended anyone before, but she could somehow envision him approaching her, perhaps shaking his hand or some such. Introducing herself.  
Seville frowned as she slipped through the shadows of high afternoon trees. Introducing herself? To a hobbit? Absurd. She decided to anticipate nothing of the sort.  
After all, the few children to spot her earlier in the day had screamed. Something couldn’t be right with her to frighten them so quickly. She had no doubt she couldn’t fit in now. The fear factor hurt her only minimally when she considered it . . . but she left it alone. It could not be remedied.  
She crouched under a bush, slowing. No one here would want her. She persisted in her desire to die immediately.

Frodo awakened the morning after spotting the girl to a wave of curiosity. He sat up in bed, in his room at Bag End, and wondered where she had come from, what she was. He hoped she had returned his book. Perhaps she had enjoyed it. He hoped with a jocose streak of thought that she hadn’t eaten it.  
He missed elevenses to go find her. He wanted to talk to her, find out who she was. He had asked Bilbo, as well as Gaffer, the day before, and neither seemed to know anything of a Ginger hobbit, much less one with black blood and a tendency towards books. Even finding the last trait in any hobbit other than a Bag End Baggins would be impossible.  
He slipped out from where Bilbo sat at his desk, drawing maps, and raced over the dirt paths and grassy hills of the Shire to go see if he could find her beneath the log still.  
When he located the tree, he saw the book almost immediately. It had been placed fairly close to where he’d left it, but he couldn’t see the girl anywhere. Then he heard a rustle of leaves behind him, and he glanced up to see the girl in the bushes there.  
Seville’s eyes widened when she looked up from her muddle and saw Frodo standing near her log, having retrieved the book from where she left it. She didn’t see why he had come back, but she hoped it had been to see her, not only to get his book back.  
Frodo approached, and Seville’s heart raced. No one approached her in the curious way he did, although she’d seen few actual people in her life . . . much less people her size. She began to shake with the strength of her pulse and her subsequent refusal to breathe—even if she did breathe it came out hard.  
Frodo cocked his head, eyeing the girl. She’d locked into herself, and now her pulse rocked her back and forth with its intense energy. She flicked her gaze to the log, and he gathered she wanted to find a way around him. But he wanted to speak to her, find out where she’d come from.  
He approached carefully, and her eyes widened. She began to tense as he walked to her, and he realized moving too fast would scare her off. As though she had never seen a hobbit up close before.  
Seville couldn’t believe the intensity of the moment, as someone willingly walked towards her . . . so slowly at that. She couldn’t handle it. She didn’t know if she wanted to run away or creep up to him, introduce herself in whatever mangled language would come out in attempting to communicate with a hobbit.  
The moment Frodo reached forward, close enough to touch her, the girl scrambled back, nearly falling over in her attempt to get away from him.  
Seville couldn’t let him touch her, and she sprang out of the bush, back into the tangled forest where he couldn’t follow her. “Wait!” he called out, but she didn’t look back. The thought terrified her. She ran about in a circle, came to the log from another angle. She eyed Frodo, his back to her, as she raced across the small clearing to where her log lay.  
When Frodo turned he saw the girl’s feet vanish under her log. He didn’t dare go towards her, for fear of scaring her away from the only place she seemed to think sanctuary. He just smiled, waved, and backed off.  
Seville watched him as he departed. She intended to learn more about him, about his life there.

For five years, she studied all of West Farthing. Occasionally she would roam the entire Shire, but somehow the little log and the presence of Frodo (even if she never spoke to him) became a little bit of home. Besides, she collected unwanted material from other hobbits, mostly books and a little bit of extremely old furnishing. It made her feel welcome somewhere, even if no one existed there to welcome her.  
Every day she found Frodo, learned what he did and how he did it. When he told stories she would sit down, listen to him for hours while his friends dozed off, came and went. She rolled her eyes at his initial mischief, admired his loyalty and naivety as well as one could from such a distance. She pined to befriend him, although the moment she got a look at her reflection in a river she dashed it away and never looked again. She couldn’t approach him, especially not when all the looks he gave her were only condescendingly encouraging.  
Somehow, though, as she learned about the Shire she realized something about her stirred, something she could not understand. And this, she grew to understand, became her fascination with Frodo. She couldn’t stop thinking about him, wondering if he could get past her darkness and her lack of propriety to be with her as a person. She craved friendship, but refused thoughts when it came to her as the friend.  
Frodo saw the girl occasionally, sitting in the distant trees or crouching in a nearby clearing. She froze whenever he looked her way. People spotted her all the way from the Took and Brandybuck fields, to Farmer Maggot’s place, and in Bagshot Row itself. People began to whisper, saying she was probably a demon, or a spy from the East. Some didn’t believe she existed. Apparently she had no home, or so Frodo soon came to gather.  
All five of those years he anticipated befriending her, learning what made her different from the other hobbits. He would leave out books sometimes, only to find them open to the climax, or flipped over the next day. He wondered how she loved them so, what she planned to be if she remained hidden all the time. But somehow, every time he attempted to approach her, he would either get distracted, forget, or simply lose conviction or courage. It evaded him for so long.  
Then finally Sam had pulled him aside to talk to him about Rosie one day, and they came back to the log.  
Seville eyed Sam dangerously, but when she looked at Frodo, sitting not three feet from her log, she recoiled into her shadows. She couldn’t but stare. Frodo caught her eye so easily, and held it faster than she wanted. Something about him. She wanted those eyes, wanted whatever Frodo had. But she had learned: he had frivolity, friends, no darkness in his life. Somehow she felt it left him ignorant, and she wanted nothing more than to join him in it.  
The moment his eyes locked on hers, she couldn’t look away, mesmerized by the color, the light, of them.  
Frodo couldn’t look away either. She terrified him in a way, but in a way that he wanted to mend. Something about her—the way she moved, the way her eyes glittered darkly, full of fear and pain—wanted help. And Frodo wanted to help. The moment he saw her under the log he wouldn’t look away.  
Frustrated, Sam shook his shoulder. “Mr. Frodo?” Then his gaze followed Frodo’s, down beneath the log. Both hobbit and anti-creature he surveyed were trapped, entranced in studying each other. “What is that?” Sam persisted.  
Frodo blinked. So did Seville.  
“One of us, Sam,” he said, shaking. His statement surprised Seville; she knew others rumored her to be a demon, a hobbit-goblin. To say she belonged with them made her more inclined to like Frodo. “Do you want to come out now?”  
Finally, Frodo realized, it all had come down to good old Sam to bring the girl out from beneath the log. Despite his shivering, he felt hope as Sam leaned forward. Seville shrank back when Sam approached; she feared all but what she understood, and hobbits . . . while she had analyzed their habits, she had no idea how to interact with them. She feared frightening Sam and Frodo away. And she could feel a small scrape on Sam’s shoulder. She had to resist attacking him for it; she hadn’t drained a wound in so long.  
“Well, what are you doing down there if you’re a hobbit?” Sam asked. Frodo hoped it would work as he extended his hand. “Come out.”  
Seville refused, growling at her instinct to touch him as she backed away. Frodo’s hopes sank. He craned his neck as she folded into a corner of her hole, glaring at Sam and wrapping her arms around her knees. Frodo felt a sudden urge to try and bring her out.  
Sam sat back. Seville hoped he felt flustered, and Frodo knew he looked afraid. “It’s no use, Mr. Frodo,” he said. “Better luck next time.” He didn’t wait for Frodo’s response as he stood and walked somewhat briskly away, probably expecting Frodo to follow.  
Seville felt a pang of remorse as she realized she had probably just thrown Frodo and Sam away from her. Frodo watched her, confused by her sudden slump. He knelt down next to the hole. Sam had done his best; Frodo only hoped he could do better, although Sam had a certain gentility to him.  
Seville and Frodo both stiffened nervously when he held his hand out, although Seville inhaled sharply, eyeing it. Frodo blinked, a little mystified. Warmth emanated from her skin in fast ripples. He hadn’t gotten too close; his hand remained suspended in the air perhaps a foot away from her, and yet he felt as warm as though he were standing near a small, cheery fire. It surprised him—he couldn’t speak for a moment. Seville couldn’t either. She had always imagined getting this close to him, but having his hand right in front of her terrified, shocked, every corner of her being. She almost went dizzy with the imagination that had become reality.  
“What’s your name?” The words tumbled out of Frodo’s mouth, and he realized he’d been considering his words for five years. Seville blinked, wondering how she ought to respond, until she realized Frodo wouldn’t know ancient Lavwun languages. Theoretically.  
Her voice squeaked in her ears, and more rubbed in Frodo’s. In truth, she hadn’t spoken to anyone but herself for half a decade, and so her voice simply resembled a high timbre male’s. “Seville,” she answered.  
Frodo blinked and cocked his head, surprised at the low pitch of her voice, and by the fact that she had actually responded. He’d expected her to hiss and run away. But he could see the fear in her eyes. Seville did not want to run. Frodo had given her the chance to speak, and she hadn’t messed up yet.  
Initial response took over Frodo. “Seville . . .?” He wanted to find out where she lived, and this would be the simplest way to do it.  
Seville shrugged nervously. “I don’t have a last name.” It unnerved her the way he studied her, the way he seemed to take in every little thing. His interest, while also embedded in fear, frightened her. She said nothing more.  
Then Frodo realized he ought to stop staring and introduce himself. He felt a little chagrined but not surprised by discovering she had no last name. It made the most sense of everything; now he knew where to find her.  
“I’m Frodo,” he said.  
She already knew. But she didn’t tell him that.  
Frodo’s hand remained extended towards her, although he had not yet lowered it into the log. Seville uncurled, and Frodo felt a surge of apprehension when her pale skin slipped into the sunlight. If, in fact, she did have black blood it became evident to him now as he studied her hand. For Seville, she couldn’t believe she would do something like this, but wanted companionship badly enough after these last few years of starving herself and not dying yet.  
When her fingers slid into place along Frodo’s palm, the gentleness of contact—as oftentimes happens when one does not perceive the dynamic of taking a young hobbit’s hand—tingled up her arm. She couldn’t understand why she felt so, and accordingly hissed as she pulled back. Her acceptance of his hand surprised Frodo as well: he’d half been expecting her hand to be scaly in texture. It rather might have been the softest hand he’d ever taken, and he realized having primarily interacted with only male hobbits during his life he should have expected this to be different.  
He stood almost immediately and turned away. Both he and Seville breathed a sigh of relief; while he’d simply been frightened, Seville felt the first pangs of fearing she had let herself go too far.  
It surprised Seville when Frodo returned the next day. She hadn’t expected him to come back, but remained dismal under her log. Five years, and she had messed it all up. Bitterness soaked through her head. Now without real purpose to exist, Seville almost wanted to go find an abandoned knife or hatchet and just get rid of herself.  
But then she heard a rustle, and she shrank back to look up at the level ground. Frodo had returned. He wanted to know more. He only felt he could coax her more easily if he actually knew things of her. If he could find where she lived it would make life even simpler, and perhaps he could coax her out of whatever demonic habits had taken over her. He swallowed as he eyed her, sinister and frightened under her log.  
He knelt down on the grass, but Seville refused to back away. She wanted to do it right this time. Frodo felt he had made progress when she did not cower at his approach.  
“Where do you come from, Seville?”  
She admittedly had no idea how to respond. She just kept her mouth shut for a moment, long enough to convince Frodo she might not say anything. He turned to leave her, again discouraged, but when she realized he would walk away she spoke abruptly, shocking him.  
“I have no family, if that’s what you mean. And I have no home.” She slowed as her statement finished, as she realized Frodo did have a family, and a home. She wanted both. She’d had them, but she’d thrown them away. Frodo wouldn’t understand, she assumed.  
Frodo felt a little pang, one he couldn’t place. Pity, perhaps, although somehow a little bit deeper. He realized he couldn’t imagine living without home, and couldn’t imagine why she wouldn’t have one.  
So he asked. “Why not?”  
It never occurred to him to be capable of offending her, but the hurt expression she gave him—remorseful and a little incredulous—caused his breath to halt for a moment as he hoped she wouldn’t run from him. But Seville felt no offense; just bitterness at herself, and shock for his deep question. It took her a moment of contemplation before she could consider a response, although it stung even as her words came out. The frank practicality in her tone surprised her, and brought Frodo’s fears to rest a little.  
“Because I’m a disgusting, dark thing,” she said, unsure why she felt so much emotion to bite back and how she found no initial need to do so. “No one would want me here.” She half felt guilty, as though it were a crime to trap a stranger between offending in words, not saying anything, or professing an untrue sense of want for her.  
Frodo frowned. What possession of mind could make her think such a thing? Everyone had someone to love, someone who wanted them. Then again, Seville had no home. “They wouldn’t?”  
Seville lifted an eyebrow, almost scoffing a little bit at her own hope that someone would someday care for her. “Would you?” The moment the words broke out of her mouth, she regretted them. She bit her lip, surveying Frodo’s face. She did want to know . . . what he initially thought. What did he think? She hoped he, if anyone, would help her resolve her regrets, losing her family the way she had, losing them on the note with the feelings she had.  
Frodo eyed her carefully. Her shadowed eyes flickered with emotions he did not understand, mostly for sake of he knew nothing about her further than a lack of home and family. He surveyed the rest of her: male attire, a huge white shirt and oversized breeches. Her boots cracked at the toes, where her feet had begun to grow out. He cocked his head; they were unnaturally small. He wondered if she had come from the men.  
He considered her question, while anxiety at his study of her built in Seville. She didn’t know why his eyes flickered over her, and didn’t understand why he could be assessing her so.  
“Yes, I would,” he said finally.  
Although he had thought about his response long enough, Seville’s odd appearance threw him off, and the moment the words came out of his mouth both he and Seville were shocked. Her jaw hung slightly open, and one eyebrow cocked. She almost demanded an explanation, and he leaped to finish.  
“That is,” he amended—her expression settled, then fell—“I would at least like to see you in the open.” Frodo’s voice slowed as he continued speaking. “I’ve never really looked at you before.” He’d never been up close to her, out in the light. He didn’t even know her eye color, beyond the black veins. In the shadow he couldn’t exactly make out her features.  
Seville wanted to come out. She wanted to show herself to Frodo, perhaps finally find acceptance. Frodo eyed her visage’s response: she seemed darkly curious, wishing to come out but not quite sure whether she wanted it, needed it, or could manage it. So, guided by a somewhat illogical desire to bring her into the open, he bent down under the log, absorbed her unnatural warmth, and easily wrapped both hands around her waist to pull her out.  
If Seville thought her sanity had come crashing down when she touched Frodo’s hand the day before, this brought her adrenaline to a dangerous level. Even as he pulled her out rather swiftly, she hissed and sputtered—frightened beyond anything—at the strength uncannily greater than her own even while she tried instinctively to scramble out of his grip. Frodo didn’t feel as though he had to pull, and expected her struggling to be a little more effective. He also somewhat berated himself for attempting to bring her up to the ground, but the moment he set her down on her feet they both halted abruptly, her hands locked on his arms.  
To his shock her eyes were level with his own, if not an inch higher. Her hair, he noticed up close, not only spread in red, fire-like torrents, but shimmered with gold and scarlet strands scattered throughout her curls. He glanced up at her eyes, down at her stark, pale hands. He could see the black blood closely now, and it frightened him. But he didn’t let go. Her lips were black as well; he had thought it the absence of light beneath the log, although he now realized it gave her a somewhat menacing, predatory air.  
He released her waist very slowly. She settled, having been so tense it made her three inches taller. She actually stood just below Frodo, and frowned at the realization of their actual height difference. Frodo almost chuckled when she sank below his height. Then he realized her hands still had a death grip on his sleeves, but the moment he turned his gaze to them she pulled sharply away. She hadn’t meant to grip him so hard.  
“You’re not going to run?” she asked. She tried to sound menacing, but she and Frodo both heard the hurt and hiding in her voice. She relaxed when he shook his head.  
“Why?” he asked. Although Seville frightened him, he’d come so far. Besides, she had no one. She might as well have a friend somewhere, and Frodo hadn’t been hurt by her yet. She could have bitten him while he pulled her out from her log.  
She blinked. She’d seen her reflection: dark blood, dark lips, wild hair, a dark grimace. She didn’t know why he wouldn’t abandon her. So she relaxed, straightening from her hunched position. “Because most people do.”


	5. 13 Years

Sev sat down on the log, and Frodo sat a good six or seven inches away. After a very uneasy start they talked for a few hours, primarily about the book Frodo had left for her to read the day they had seen each other for the first time, before Sam approached and Seville dove back under her log. Frodo introduced the two, and somehow Seville managed to relax enough and Sam managed not to fear her for a minute or so.  
It took a few weeks of afternoons—once Seville noted Frodo would introduce her to other hobbits as his friend—for her to truly open up. Soon after Frodo and Sam began visiting, Seville noticed they would nudge each other, palm each other’s faces dead on in a gesture of jocose disdain, and chase each other around. The first time she did the second of three to Frodo, a dark blush rose to her face, but he and Sam simply broke out laughing following a moment of shock. She laughed too, and it felt amazing for her. Frodo simply found it progress in the way of befriending a homeless, scary hobbit girl.  
It helped Frodo that she couldn’t sneak up on him, and they couldn’t approach each other without him, at least, being aware of her presence. Her warmth carried a certain gentility he never found anywhere but the fireplace. Even so, a fire had smoke and spat embers; Seville had neither. Just friendly conversation and comfort. He never told her about the warmth. Seville wondered how he always knew if she had come, for he called out to her when she didn’t herself know they were close together. But she did love their talks. She realized, soon, that she’d found a friend within Frodo. Frodo Baggins, she learned, of Bag End, which she visited often. She met Bilbo Baggins after knowing Frodo for a few months, and he warmed up to her very quickly. She found herself nerve-wracked by his boisterous embraces, but accepted them.  
In one conversation a few months into their friendship, Frodo told Seville of a book he had recently read . . . but having been in a habit of doing it to Sam for so long, the other hobbit’s name slipped his tongue in addressing Seville. His eyes widened when he recognized his mistake, but Seville laughed uncontrollably beside him. She could imagine herself as dear young Sam, with his sweet, slow nature and handsome gentility . . . looking at it that way, she sarcastically told herself she could be exactly like Sam. Frodo grinned, shaking his head nervously.  
“I’m sorry!” she gasped. “I’m sorry . . . I can just imagine what you were thinking!”  
She didn’t elaborate, so Frodo just shrugged apologetically. “I beg your pardon,” he said uncertainly. “I didn’t mean to.”  
Seville shook her head quickly, swallowing to slow herself. She didn’t want to make him feel bad. Hence laughing; but it had not worked. “No, actually,” she said, holding up a hand. “I would rather you call me Sam than Seville.” She didn’t want Frodo thinking of her as what she knew to be “dark blood” anymore. Besides, Frodo felt a deep connection with Sam; while Seville hadn’t the mortal capability to be attracted romantically to anyone just yet, she still yearned to be Frodo’s best friend—better than Sam. Frodo’s personality appealed highly to her.  
Frodo lifted an eyebrow. “I can’t call you Sam,” he said. “I already have Sam.” Seville and Sam were nothing alike; his getting them confused only sprouted from spending so much time with both. Although he almost leaned towards spending time with Seville, simply because when he told a story she wouldn’t leave him be until he finished. She actually loved hearing him talk, and sometimes took his stories in wild directions, adding elements he never could have imagined, although she thought him the most avid storyteller. No. Seville could not be Sam.  
“Call me Sev, then,” Seville said, throwing her hand in the air. Then she righted her spine, and Frodo cocked his head. Essence, life-force. Seville could live with a name like that. “Hey. Actually, that sounds perfect.” She turned to him. “Would you be all right, calling me Sev?”  
Frodo nodded, and Sev breathed a sigh of relief, running her new, shorter, brighter name through her head a few times. It certainly sounded more hobbit-like to Frodo, and he had associated the name Seville with the demon gossip of East and West Farthing, of a nightmare only he and Sam had ever been able to tap into the friendship of. Befriending a demon . . . Frodo never would have imagined it. Perhaps he might have, in a story. But having the unusual, warm girl sitting beside him on a log presented story in reality to him, something he had never done before.  
Calling her Sev somehow improved the relationship for them both. Sev felt cared about, particularly when Sam approached calling her “Ms. Sev.” Apparently Frodo had passed the word, at least to Sam. Frodo felt a new friendship arise, and he realized after some time how he initially sought her warmth and her desire to listen to him, and the laughter she sometimes stirred deep within him. Sev, he realized after some time, had a quick, snarky wit and jocose smarts to follow it. Anytime he brought this up she insisted she possessed nothing of the sort and shoved her hand over his face. She didn’t believe in her own positive traits, and never wanted to assume anything. Being desired for company left her feeling confused, if not in a happy sort of way. She simply didn’t know how to handle it.  
After two years, Sev craved spending more time with Frodo than just afternoons at Bag End. She followed him to the Green Dragon tavern one night. But the moment she slipped inside and another hobbit shut the door behind her, she nearly had a heart attack from the crowds, noise, heat, and packed space. She scrambled to leave, but Frodo had already seen her. He quickly distributed the mugs he carried and raced over to her just as she fit her hand around the doorknob.  
“Sev, come inside,” he insisted. He’d thought about bringing her here before, but had never done it. He figured if he could show the whole Shire what Sev really had deep down, they would accept her. She could have a home.  
Sev shook her head wildly, hunched over. A menacing look sparked in the back of her eyes, along with solid refusal, but she said nothing until her eyes flickered to behind the Green Dragon counter. Rosie Cotton approached Frodo and Sev then, and Sev backed against the wall.  
“Sev,” Frodo said gently, laying a hand on her shoulder. The contact—the only time he had touched her without humorous intent since meeting her—shocked her into freezing in place. “This is Rosie Cotton.” He turned back to Rosie, who had a curious, if not terrified, expression on her face. She did her best to contain her surprise as she surveyed Sev, who began to unfold beneath Frodo’s hand, and stood up straighter. The anti-creature glanced at him, assessing why she would let him do something so controlling over her.  
Sev extended her hand, as she had seen hobbits do. “A pleasure, Miss Cotton,” she said, but her voice trembled.  
Rosie almost broke down from pity then. She shook Sev’s hand, then covered it with her other one. Frodo backed away slowly while she introduced herself; Rosie had such a gentle soul, exactly what Sev needed in a place like the Green Dragon.   
While Rosie situated Sev behind the counter and asked her questions about herself, Sev pondered Frodo. She cocked her head, studying him as he sang and danced out with Merry and Pippin. He had fairly forgotten she’d come, but he could almost feel her gaze behind him. She analyzed all of his actions she could recall. She really liked him, she realized. His stories, his relatively solemn yet carefree approach to life, the way he looked at her like an old friend, the way he seemed to accept her how no one else ever had, the way he treated her like a valuable person. Granted, Sev hadn’t the physical capability to fall in love, but Willation had mentioned something about falling in love with someone who could help. She almost felt it, but the moment the word “love” materialized in her head she threw it out. Not Frodo, no. A best friend, not a lover.  
Hadn’t Willation said a best friend, once a relationship went so far, made a lover?  
Sev’s eyes widened, and she shook her head. She asserted never to think the thought again. Frodo still had eleven years off of 33; she couldn’t think anything of the sort.  
The Green Dragon did, however, bring change primarily to Sev’s world. She learned in the course of an additional six years how to socialize without any external signs of cowardice, and a more gentle approach to people who needed help. She grew to love Rosie Cotton as a close companion, although she preferred Frodo’s company and associated with Rosie little outside of her work cleaning mugs. Even so, while Frodo watched her laugh and talk with Rosie he felt somewhat jealous, but to an extent he felt he could extinguish within easily.  
Sev also grew to associate with Merry and Pippin. Frodo hadn’t felt any reservation in introducing the two to Sev, although the moment Pippin’s eyes flickered over her face flirtatiously Frodo knew he had done something Sev hadn’t learned to handle. Merry bowed graciously over her hand and kissed it; some twang deep down in Frodo caused him to step back as Sev rather sweetly—and very flirtatiously—responded. Admittedly Sev had never felt shivers before, not since she had tried to take Frodo’s hand 10 years before, and she had no idea how to react to this. She found herself liking Pippin and Merry; they indeed seemed to find her amiable.  
As for the two of them, they had seen her often at the Green Dragon, and simply intended to flirt with as many girls as possible. Part of it, perhaps, appealed to their mortal nature as initially kind, if not despicable, people. They had seen her avoid friendly contact, and somehow were able to initiate a feeling of flirtation within her. They certainly enjoyed flirting; why shouldn’t everyone?  
Sev, since Frodo had pulled her from the log, watched all mature physically. While she had never looked like a female from shoulders to ankles, as Sev stayed with the hobbits she found herself growing differently. It disturbed her, but as she watched Rosie become a woman she couldn’t help but admire the girl’s blossomed, pink-cheeked beauty. She overheard Sam speaking nervously to Frodo about Rosie, and realized he liked her.  
So she told Rosie, who laughed nervously. “Dear Samwise Gamgee,” she said. But then she stared off at him, where he sat at a table smoking and trying not to look at her; Frodo had advised not seeming like a stalker. “I wonder if he truly does . . .”  
Sev cackled to herself. A mutual attraction, and she finally knew something about it.  
As for Sam himself, he sometimes would approach Sev and ask if he looked good enough. For what he never specified, but Sev knew the answer. She’d look him up and down, and soon realized Rosie couldn’t possibly help but find him attractive. Sam had a strong, gentle nature, and would make an excellent husband. Sev nodded every time he asked. While Sev would never have married him herself, she knew he asked about being physically attractive; she certainly thought him so.  
Merry and Pippin grew to be brilliant young men as well, although still had an ever-present streak of mischief never to go away. Sev couldn’t wait to see them off into their own families. Two very lucky women were out there waiting for charmed lives as the wives of Merry and Pippin; Sev just didn’t know when.  
Frodo she tried not to think about, but eventually gave up; she found it impossible not to think him attractive. It had grown from the light in his eyes and perhaps the aesthetic of his face to what most mortals consider admiration in the way of being attracted. But this time, while Sev grew into being capable of liking a young man for his own sake, she already accidentally enhanced her attraction to Frodo by thinking of him as her closest friend . . . by, what anyone else would have said, falling in love with him. She refused to let her encounters with him become dreadfully silent or untoward, but as she felt more of a desire to hold his hand, perhaps embrace him (for she had never done so, never had the strength to), it became harder to be herself without wishing he could see her for something more than he treated her.  
Frodo couldn’t have noticed less. Sev had only ever grown physically right along with him, and now they really did stand level with each other. He had lost height advantage, but didn’t entirely mind. He sought Sev’s company on a deeper plane, even if he himself couldn’t realize he had grown to love her. Love never even crossed his mind, and it didn’t have to. Sev had always been the demon friend; he didn’t consider her becoming more. She knew he never felt any different, although she could see some of the change. She dismissed it of herself, not counting on him ever seeing her as beautiful, and counting on his ignorance in the way of romance.


	6. Gandalf the Grey

Frodo truly began to realize what Sev meant to him on September the 22nd, 13 years after he met her, on his 33rd birthday. Bilbo announced to him early in the morning of Gandalf’s arrival, and after eating second breakfast Frodo grabbed a book and headed to the easternmost gate of the Shire to wait for the wizard. He decided, though, to sit in the more comfortable roots of a tree some hundred yards away or so, and jogged up the hill from the gate to sit there. He didn’t dare attempt to find Sev to read with him; she liked to prowl in the mornings, and he knew it would be impossible to find her.  
Sev remained—prowling, as he anticipated—near Bag End, unaware Frodo had left . . . with a tempting fantasy book in hand. She watched as party-goers knocked at Bilbo’s door, calling out for information on how he wanted the party field set up. She could hear Bilbo within: “Frodo, someone’s knocking at the door!” Sev debated as Bilbo grew more and more irritated, unsure if she should let the matter pass, answer the questions herself, or go find Frodo. She decided upon the last, as most hobbits still disapproved of her nigh living at Bag End and would be nothing short of appalled to see her. She knew this, for she spent every night under her log, and people whimpered with fear as she skulked through the shadows. She had thought some would care about her enough to distract her from Frodo’s significant lack of interest; she had no one. He still cared for her the most of anyone.  
And so she sprang away from the side yards of Bag End, leaping over bushes and dodging through trees. She gathered he had gone to greet Gandalf.  
Lo and behold, she was right. Sev bit her lip triumphantly. She didn’t even have to go all the way down to the gate. Frodo had situated himself against a tree, twisting a blade of grass in his mouth as he read. She eyed the book hungrily; usually they read as the two of them, but apparently he hadn’t come to find her. She shrugged it off and crept over to him, hoping he would drop the book and go back to help Bilbo.  
But he didn’t. So she settled against the tree, listened to the beautiful silence of Frodo Baggins enraptured in a book. A smile crept over her face as she imagined his expression, felt the gentle tension in the air as the story pulled at his emotions and psyche. Frodo could hear her coming just barely, and when she settled against the tree Frodo felt her warmth. He almost wanted to turn and pull her to his side of the tree, feel the numbing warmth against his side while he watched her read. She had the most insane habit of reacting strongly to what the characters in her books did, and she would grumble at them sarcastically, perhaps give a wistful moan during kissing scenes. His head cocked when he realized he could read the latter now, and they almost enhanced the story in a way.  
After Sev sat down, she remained for an hour or two before Frodo heard a familiar voice singing. He paused, gently setting the book aside; the sound faded in and out, and he almost thought he’d imagined it. Sev frantically kept herself pinned to the ground—finally the valiant reader abandoned his novel. She waited for him patiently. He turned and began running towards the hill overlooking the gate he had planned to wait near.  
Sev snaked around the tree and carefully slipped her hand beneath the book’s pages. Her eyes widened at the cleanliness of them; he’d gotten this book recently. Apparently she hadn’t read it before. Usually books were worn with care before she got to them. She quickly memorized his page number—58—and tore off over the grass after him.  
Frodo halted on the hill when Gandalf approached in his cart, pulled by a single horse. He crossed his arms over his chest and eyed the wizard sternly. “You’re late,” he said.  
Gandalf reined in the horse, and it tossed its head as he turned to Frodo. “A wizard is never late, Frodo Baggins.” Sev approached, ducking behind a nearby bush. Neither hobbit nor wizard saw or heard her. “Nor is he early,” Gandalf continued as Sev watched. “He arrives precisely when he means to!”  
Sev felt apprehension at the dark expressions on the faces of both Frodo and Gandalf, but both soon collapsed into laughter. Sev snickered, watching Gandalf. But when Frodo’s laugh rang through her ears she shrank into her shadows. She liked his laugh, but didn’t want to, not when he wouldn’t take her for his own.  
Frodo leaped forward, off the hill. “It’s wonderful to see you, Gandalf!” He chuckled as Gandalf embraced him, then set him down on the seat beside. Sev simply watched, wistfully wondering if Frodo would ever let her fall into his arms so readily.  
Gandalf clapped Frodo’s shoulder. “You didn’t think I’d miss your uncle’s birthday?” He continued as they drove along; Sev leaped off the hill and followed them, easily keeping up with the lumbering horse. The two within the cart couldn’t think to look back, but Sev didn’t need them to. She felt fine just listening to them. She and Gandalf didn’t get along as the best of two friends; she thought him somewhat sarcastic and a little condescending, although pleasant to be around. She shrugged to herself with a snarky grin as she walked. Not everyone could be Frodo.  
“So how is the old rascal?” Gandalf asked. “I hear it’s going to be a party of special magnificence.”  
Frodo shook his head. Dear Bilbo . . . “You know Bilbo,” he said. “He’s got the whole place in an uproar.”  
Gandalf chuckled—“Well, that should please him,”—and Sev snickered, but Frodo continued. “Half the Shire’s been invited! And the rest are turning up anyway.” All three laughed, but Sev kept it quiet enough as not to be heard.  
Frodo proceeded to ask Gandalf what had been going on. Sev perked up then, having always loved Frodo’s adventurous side, and tales Gandalf had to tell. Gandalf simply said life carried on, much to the disappointment of both hobbit and anti-creature in company. It surprised neither, though; Gandalf didn’t always have something to say about the outside world.  
Then the conversation turned to Bilbo. Frodo worried about him. “He’s been acting a bit odd lately.” Sev snickered, and Gandalf looked at him a little quizzically. “I mean, more than usual,” he clarified. “He spends hours poring over old maps when he thinks I’m not looking.”  
Sev feared Frodo’s solemn swoop. He had such a bright heart, and it hurt her to watch it be torn down in any way. It reminded her of herself in a twisted sort of way, although Frodo had a more stable maturity rate; the pace of hers bounced around like an unpredictable bird in a slowly moving cage. He represented everything solid to her, everything carefree and bright. Everything handsome. At this thought she shook her head wildly, staring at the ground as she dragged her feet. She listed to herself the imperfections—the many, the obvious—in him she had found over the years.  
But she didn’t want to see him break in any way. She protected him from anything she thought could harm him, and Bilbo fit the category on occasion.  
“He’s up to something,” Frodo mused. Sev wondered if she could get away with telling him Bilbo planned to leave; perhaps Frodo already knew. Gandalf watched Frodo, but the moment Frodo turned to meet his eyes the wizard turned away, seeming oblivious.  
Frodo lifted an eyebrow. “All right, keep your secrets.”  
The wizard looked flustered.  
“I know you have something to do with it. Before you came along, we Bagginses were very well thought of!”  
Sev lifted an eyebrow. Gandalf’s eyes widened. “Indeed?”  
“Never went on any adventures or did anything unexpected,” Frodo laid out.  
Gandalf sighed, exasperated, and fidgeted with the reins as well as his pipe. “If you’re referring to the incident with the dragon, I was barely involved! All I did was . . . give your uncle a little nudge out of the door!”  
Frodo chuckled, and Sev’s eyes lifted. Dear Gandalf. “Whatever you did,” Frodo continued, “you’ve been officially labeled a disturber of the peace.” He didn’t continue when Gandalf turned away, feigning innocence so thickly Frodo didn’t understand why he would attempt it.  
They reached the suburbs of West Farthing, where the children gathered, shouting Gandalf’s name as they approached the back of the cart. Some greeted Sev—to Frodo’s confusion, but he assumed someone saw her prowling about—and Sev nodded back to them. She smiled when one of the curly-haired hobbits waved. She wondered why the sudden warmth.  
But then the children all stared wistfully after Gandalf’s cart, voices rising in question as he drove away. Frodo and Sev both looked up at Gandalf, hoping he would do something. The children wanted fireworks.  
Gandalf smacked his lips together ambivalently, and then a crowd of sparks and colors exploded from Gandalf’s cart. Sev whooped in surprise and ducked, clinging to the cart as the fireworks fell behind them. She grabbed her heart, lungs heaving. The explosion continued to ring in her ears, and she blinked it back, laughing. Frodo heard her, but as she quieted he thought she fell behind them. He smiled, glancing up at Gandalf, who chuckled.  
Sev looked up when Frodo stood abruptly. “Gandalf,” he said, “I’m glad you’re back.” She dove into a nearby bush as he leaped off of the cart. “So am I, dear boy!” Gandalf called after him, and the cart continued up to Bag End.  
Sev slipped open the book and began reading. She hoped Frodo would join her, but had sandwiched herself into the corner of foliage enough she knew he might not find her. But even as Frodo turned back to look for her or his book, he heard her squawk at what he assumed she translated as a romance scene. She loved those, and wouldn’t read a book twice if it didn’t have a good one. He glanced down at a nearby bush, only to see her nose buried in the book he’d left by the tree.  
Sev flipped madly through the pages, scanning them quickly. She berated characters for making the wrong decisions, and sarcastically congratulated them under her breath when they finally realized more about the story, which she had already guessed. Frodo chuckled to himself, but she did not look up . . . only quieted for a blink of a moment and shuffled with anticipation.  
As she read, Frodo studied her. He cocked his head, realizing she truly had grown. He noticed she had abandoned shoes, although her feet had no hair on them. She had adapted to full hobbit dress, although he noted her attire looked three sizes too big. She’d rolled the sleeves back in thick bundles on either arm to stay above her wrists, much less her elbows.  
He chuckled initially at her sudden change in expression, although a little closer to her than he had been. He expected her to look up, but she didn’t. He wondered how close he could get before she noticed. He knelt down next to her and slipped his fingers over her foot. She flicked it away, pulled it back in to herself, but kept on reading. But he wanted to read with her, and so had to coax her out of the bush. Only one option left now.  
His hand slid into the book; Sev hadn’t been expecting it, hadn’t noticed him nearby. She abandoned the book with an unintelligibly rapid curse word (one she had come up with herself) and dove into the bush behind her. Leaves shook off in her wake, and Frodo laughed uncontrollably. Sev blushed furiously when she emerged; as Frodo regarded her blush—light gray subsequent of her black blood—and sheepish expression he could only laugh harder.  
She wanted to laugh with him, but even as she held it all back she walked briskly up to him, working hard to contain herself. Trying to look as solemn as possible, she said, “Thou pokest thy hands unbidden into a novel of my possession, Sir Baggins, and so I reclaim it!” She shoved her hand over his face, and his grip on the book slackened. The warmth of her fingers surprised him, and in contrast to what usually came across as a rough movement between Frodo and his other companions Sev had rather a gentle, almost soft, way of doing it.  
She grabbed the book and slipped away. He had to think quickly for a reply that matched her statement.  
“I only set to reclaim mine of the first; this action is unjust, mademoiselle.”  
“You wish it back?” she asked, her voice softening but escalating in pitch. She flicked her eyes to the page number and memorized it, then clapped the book shut in her hands, ready to run. “Then come and fight for it!” She turned and dashed away. She had to move quickly, she knew: Frodo could beat her easily, much less overtake her with a book at stake.  
It didn’t take long for him to catch up, and when his arm locked around her waist she stiffened. Frodo turned for the book, but it easily slipped into his fingers. Unlike most people Sev didn’t physically fight. Frodo wanted to continue, but Sev had no intention of doing so. She also had no intention of holding his arm in place around her . . . and yet somehow she managed to do it. He glanced at her hand over his own and cocked his head. The moment Sev realized what she had done she released him and backed away.  
Sev looked a little chagrined to Frodo, although why he didn’t understand. She simply hadn’t wanted to act on anything physical, however small it might have been, but Frodo thought she planned to leave for how quickly she backed away. So he grabbed her elbow and sat her down by his side against another nearby tree.  
“Why do you let go so easily?” he mused. Sev shrugged, and Frodo took it as enough of an answer. He opened the book to the front, but Sev shook her head beside him. She took pride in memorization, and didn’t want to have to make him start over.  
“58,” she said.  
“Where were you?” he asked.  
She shook her head. “65 or so.” She nudged him lightly, and heat rose to her face being so close to him. He couldn’t have noticed; Sev’s initial warmth made it difficult to tell. “You always were a richer reader.”  
“Slower,” he countered casually, turning to his book. She nudged him again, a little harder.  
“Devil. You just had the whole morning to indulge.”  
“You read 65 pages in an hour.”  
She gave him a hurt expression. “I only had 10 minutes in that book!” She slapped a hand over her heart. “You underestimate me, Frodo.”  
Frodo shook his head with a chuckle, and as he read (from page 58, for Sev would likely turn back there if he tried going to 65 and then leave when he refused to comply) Sev began reacting rather openly, chuckling from time to time. Frodo had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. After a moment or two, though, she finished the pages, long before he even started them. She cautiously laid her head on his shoulder, assuming his reading would take some time. Subconsciously she nestled into his side, and for a moment felt safe. Frodo noticed more than she did, and wondered why her unnatural warmth settled him so close.  
She read the pages three more times, growing a little impatient, ready to carry on with the story she already knew by heart at this point. Frodo watched her, craning his neck back to look at her expression as it transitioned from furrowed to epiphanic. Sev understood he would never take so long to read a pair of pages, and she subsequently looked up, apprehensive. Frodo chuckled, and she sprang away from his side, suddenly conscious of being so close to him. She absentmindedly brushed her sleeves in a jocose gesture.  
Only luckily enough for her, Frodo took no notice of affection in those moments. His eyes were suddenly sucked back in to the book, and for a moment he hoped she would come back. He missed her already, although she had gone nowhere. Then the story pulled him in. He forgot about everything around him.  
Sev turned to read again, but began to study him instead, before she could get close enough to read over his shoulder. She watched his careful fingers as they flickered over the book. She cocked her head, glanced up at his face. His blue eyes grew sharp and focused, fascinated by the words he read. How he’d managed to notice her head against his shoulder while in such a novel she didn’t know. She took her time, experimenting in her head. She considered what his hair would feel like if she could just hold his head for a while, what would happen if he let her caress his gentle face, what it would be like on so many emotional and physical levels if she kissed him.  
She blinked, shocked at herself, and she bit her lower lip until it stung. Her eyes slipped closed; she couldn’t possibly pull something so sudden. Something within her rationalized she had known him for 13 years, and they were close friends. So why couldn’t she?  
She stopped herself with a single thought: Because he doesn’t care.  
Sev began fingering the grass near her feet to keep her thoughts at least partially directed somewhere else. But while Frodo happened to be nearby, she intended somewhat hesitantly to ask if he would accompany her solely to the dance at his own birthday. Usually couples only did so were they courting, but she’d only danced with him once (and horribly) the last time. Now she wanted a chance to do it right.  
But to ask him now . . . she knew she didn’t like being interrupted in the middle of a book. Just because she had learned to comply with external interruption didn’t mean she wanted to have him deal with it.  
“Frodo?” she asked gently, quietly enough he would only notice if he were paying any attention at all. He had left some sector of mentality for when she did anything, in case she came back and did anything entertaining. It slipped through the murk of a distant world in Frodo’s head, and he acknowledged her by turning his head slightly, but he had to finish the chapter first.  
Sev winced a little. “I’m sorry—,”  
He shook his head, glancing up from the book. He set it aside and patted the ground next to him, waiting for her to come and join him. Sev exhaled slowly and slipped over to his side. The initial grin on his face, one not typically initiated consciously, made her feel safe. Everything about him, despite the worry of being rejected for her darkness, made Sev feel more safe than usual around him.  
Sev swallowed when Frodo glanced at her, wondering why she looked so nervous. “Bilbo’s birthday—and yours—are to be celebrated tonight, at Bag End . . .” Sev trailed off, and Frodo cocked his head, urging her to continue. “ . . . and I wondered if—,” She had to stop when she looked up and made the mistake of eye contact. It shocked her into a halt. Frodo simply felt confused.  
“You love dancing, do you not?” The words rushed from Sev’s mouth after the initial shock of his bright, gentle eyes faded away. Frodo nodded. “Could I accompany you . . . tonight?” Sev bit her lip. She almost wanted to ask if he would do it for her, but she felt it too much a question of attraction. Perhaps he wouldn’t care how she worded it.  
She saw him shrug, but Frodo actually felt his spirits lift a little. The things Sev showed enthusiasm for excited Frodo, if only for everything she emanated. She hadn’t enjoyed it the first time, until she told him Sam had been teaching her. Or, at least, he attributed his excitement to hers; something deep down whispered perhaps he just wanted to dance with Sev for his own reasons, and his heart fluttered. He shoved it back, unsure.  
“Sure!” Nothing more could come out, not with an inner battle on the rise. His confusion threw him back into his book.  
Sev didn’t notice, couldn’t know. Frodo’s acceptance of her request excited her too much to process. Both of them could feel excitement boiling in her blood; she felt the need to run it off. “Really?” Frodo almost questioned her about her surprise. Of course he wanted to. “When do you want to meet me, and where?”  
Frodo felt his resolve crumble and his pulse quicken. He didn’t understand, and so his words came out muddled. “I’ll come get you,” he said, not even sure what came out of his mouth. “Right after afternoon tea . . .” It would give him some time to think.  
Excitement swallowed Sev. She had to run. She stood, and Frodo’s gaze flickered to her. He didn’t want her to leave, but he couldn’t process with her sitting there. He shivered with the sudden departure of warmth. He threw himself into his book, investing in something he almost didn’t care about for the present.  
“See you then!” Sev called out as she raced away. She ran faster than she ever had, bounding over logs and bushes with driven ease. She hadn’t spent enough energy by the time she made it back to her log, so she ran some more. When she finally ducked under the wooden span she slipped into one of the huge, soft chairs thrown out by other hobbits. Books from Bag End lined the crevices she had carved into the dirt walls. She picked up a silver ring Frodo had given her many years before. He’d been tired and sick that day, and passed the time by etching her name into the tarnished metal, had given it to her in passing for no evident reason.  
She slipped it over her right ring finger, unsure why she didn’t wear it more often. The cold metal against her skin warmed as she sat back, waiting for Frodo to come. She clutched the ring to her heart as the day’s events passed through her mind; he would accept her, but only to one extent or another. Never fully. Perhaps Willation had said what he did for naught, as Sev had always suspected; she’d never have to worry about loving the wrong man, for the man she loved did not reciprocate it.


	7. A Night to Remember

After Frodo finished the next chapter or so, he grew too restless. He didn’t understand himself, or his lack of focus on the novel before him. He stood, setting the book aside as he often did. Sev would find it if he couldn’t; she always found his lost books, and after a while Bilbo made a game of it, telling her she could keep anything Frodo left in the woods. But she returned them whenever Frodo felt the need to read them . . . and stole them back after he finished.  
He chuckled to himself at the thought. Then he sighed, thinking of when he had wrapped his arms around her to get the book back. He’d never thought about it before, not in the way of . . . of holding her. He swallowed as he considered it. It made no sense to want it again.  
Frodo glanced up at the approximate area of the sun. Sev would be waiting for him. He stood to go find her, and realized when he said he would come get her he had no idea where to get her from. So he started by going to Bag End, but he could find her nowhere. He asked Bilbo, but Bilbo ignored him in favor of talking to Gandalf. Neither seemed to know or care about Sev’s location.  
So he left for the Gamgees’. He saw Sam outside the Cottons’ home just down the road, and he slipped across the cobblestones. As he approached, he saw Sam blushing madly as he handed Rosie flower garlands nicely accented with ribbons. He noted how Rosie graciously thanked Sam, and the poor boy’s face only turned deep purple as he muttered a thanks. Frodo paused when he saw the garlands up close; they were intricately done. Sam had apparently put a lot of time into them.  
Sam acknowledged Frodo a few minutes before it would have been necessary. “Hello, Mr. Frodo,” he said, shivering. Rosie acknowledged Frodo as well. After he greeted them, he jumped right to it.  
“Have either of you seen Sev?” he asked. Rosie, hopefully, would know where to find her, but she shook her head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Baggins. I’m afraid I haven’t.”  
“Call me Frodo, Rosie,” he said with a grin. “Please.” He hoped having Rosie call him on a first-name basis would make Sam more comfortable around her. Rosie nodded with a bright smile, and both turned to Sam.  
Sam slid on his feet over to Frodo, although Frodo had been expecting him to just shake his head, nod, or freeze; Frodo understood fear, fear of Sev, but he knew he felt nothing like Sam did around Rosie.  
But Sam’s voice cut through the air with a whisper. “I haven’t seen her, Mr. Frodo.”  
Frodo strained not to laugh, and so did Rosie. Frodo whispered back, just loudly enough for Rosie to hear, “Is this information such that Rosie shouldn’t know, Sam?” Rosie bit back a laugh and hung her head.  
Sam had no response to Frodo’s question for a minute. He looked a little confused and flustered.  
“No, Mr. Frodo,” he said finally, still calculating why or why not Rosie shouldn’t know.  
Frodo nodded. “Thank you, Sam. Rosie.” He turned away to let them continue, but Sam timidly bowed a little to Rosie and scrambled after Frodo instead. Frodo snickered and shook his head. Poor Sam.  
“Usually Sev isn’t where someone could find her, Mr. Frodo,” Sam said, catching up. “It could take you all day to find her.”  
Frodo shrugged. “She told me to meet her for afternoon tea, but I have no idea where.”  
Sam frowned. “It could be any number of places. Good luck, Mr. Frodo.”  
“Thank you for the encouragement, Sam.” Frodo clapped Sam on the shoulder before Sam turned back toward Bag End, and Frodo set off again to see if he couldn’t find Sev. He wondered if he ought to check the log. He met Gandalf on the way back to the log, near enough to Bag End that Gandalf walked back and forth. Soon Frodo began helping to drag fireworks over to the party, and a plethora of other things that he could not particularly recall later. The remainder of the day mostly blurred by until the sun had set.  
Sev waited the entire day, but Frodo never showed up. She curled in a ball, but kept her ring on, staring at her name scratched into the surface, wondering if Frodo would ever care enough. Despite her desire to go explore and prowl, she wanted to wait for him, see if he would come. He didn’t, but Merry and Pippin did . . . they passed her log seven times, arms linked, but never looked at her until the very last, when Merry waggled his eyebrows and gestured for her to follow. At her snicker, he gave a triumphant bow and kept walking back to the party.  
She watched Sam, as the evening drew closer, walk towards the party. Soon, however, he abruptly turned back and began pacing in the field before her log. She followed his gaze across the dirt road to where Rosie stood, smiling and handing out flower garlands to all the women who entered. She saw their gazes flicker to each other, Sam’s eyes frightened and Rosie’s wistful.  
Sev cackled to herself. Mental matchmaking, and she could probably do something about it. She intended to ask Rosie if she’d let Sam court him. Sam would be the hard one to deal with. Her thoughts wandered from Sam and Rosie to Frodo, and how she almost wished someone would get him to like her. But no one could. If he didn’t love her, he never would, and no one could push it on him. Sev would never be happy knowing Frodo didn’t love her if circumstances came to letting her show her affection.  
Sam thumping as he sat against her log shook her out of her thoughts. He sighed, and she glanced up at him.  
“Sam?”  
Sam sat upright, nodding to her. He always had such a gentle air, particularly towards women. “Ms. Sev.” The polite thing; such a wonderful boy. Sev grinned when she thought of how he would treat her Rosie if he ever got the courage to ask her to marry him.  
“Are you all right?” Sev asked.  
Sam sighed again, then glanced at the ground. He rubbed his thumbs together. “I’m fine,” he said. Then he paused. “How about you, then?”  
Sev wanted to sigh as well. Unrequited love, although for Sam at least the girl liked him back. For Sev at least Frodo showed no fear. “You know, just . . . living. As usual.” Unfortunately the usual made her statement a sentiment, knowing Frodo wouldn’t turn around now.  
Sam’s eyebrows drew together. “You sure?”  
Sev nodded. She didn’t want to lay out all of her problems on poor Sam. She sat back in her chair, fingering her ring, feeling the grooves where Frodo’s hand had likely brushed away bits of metal from the surface to smooth it out.  
As Sam laid against the log, Sev had what she considered a wickedly wonderful thought. “Sam, have you spoken to Rosie today?”  
Sam froze, and Sev snuck closer to him, waggling her shoulders expectantly. “Not that I recollect, Ms. Sev,” he said quickly, although Sev could see—even in the fading daylight—the color rise to his cheeks.  
“Well, why not?” Sev persisted. “Weren’t you the one to grow the flowers for her garlands and head-ringlets made for this evening?”  
He turned pinker, if anything. “I beg your pardon, Ms. Sev, but there wasn’t anything needed to be said, honest.”  
Sev’s grin deepened as her mischief plowed through Sam’s resistance. “Oh, yes, but I’m sure she’d love a sweet ‘hello’ once in a while, particularly from you.” She paused, leaning closer to Sam. “She told me she finds it very tender indeed when a kind young man such as yourself takes her hand.”  
He brightened again, and Sev resisted the urge to laugh. He would love to hold her hand, and yet shirked from it. He shook his head.  
“Today’s Mr. Frodo’s birthday,” he said, abruptly changing the subject.  
Sev nodded, solemn now. She watched the sun set on the possibility of Frodo coming for her. The party had almost begun. “I noticed,” she said.  
Sam turned to her. “Ms. Sev?”  
Her smile came out weak. “It’s nothing, Sam. I guess . . . oh, I don’t know.” She didn’t understand why she had expected more than forgetfulness from Frodo. His enthusiasm from earlier had given her false hope.  
Sam frowned. “What is it, Sev?”  
She sighed, letting it loose for a moment. “I suppose I almost expected Frodo to accompany me to the party as he said he would.”  
Sam’s eyes deepened, as if lost in thought. It didn’t take much.  
“Well, I’m sure Mr. Frodo will at least dance with you,” he finally offered. “I don’t know why it would matter so much, Ms. Sev, but he may yet. He’s not flighty on purpose.”  
Sev glanced up at Sam. “If not on purpose, then how?”  
“He’s thinking about other things, Ms. Sev.”  
She conceded to the idea, if not grudgingly, and Sam sheepishly took his leave. Rosie had gone, and so had the sun. Hobbits were gathering at the front gate, and Gandalf made his way down a nearby hill with Bilbo off the distant hill. Frodo would be among the party-goers.  
“Time to get out there,” Sev said to herself.  
Sam raced across the street before Sev climbed out of her log, and he raced up to the party tree, where Frodo had begun to string lights across the branches, looping them back and forth to get as much light into the tree as possible.  
“Mr. Frodo?” he called up into the tree.  
Frodo glanced down. “Yes, Sam?”  
“I found Sev.”  
Frodo’s eyes widened, and he glanced down. “Where is she, Sam?”  
Sam turned and pointed back towards Bag End, where Sev had just crawled and wriggled out from under the log. She very heavily and quietly made her way over to the party, very easily avoiding all contact with the other hobbits. She didn’t want to associate, and knew the party would only make her feel worse.  
“She’s been waiting for you all day. I told her you forgot, Mr. Frodo, and I don’t think she’s upset.”  
Frodo nodded uncertainly. He’d never done something like—all right, he’d done it a few—no, many, many times when he thought about it. Generally hobbits didn’t care. Now as he thought about it, he recognized Sev’s expression when she felt disappointed. She just would watch him a little strangely, as though trying to decide whether to strangle him or herself. So she wouldn’t react badly; it would have to be good enough. If necessary he would apologize later.  
Frodo moved to approach Sev, but just then Rosie asked him if he would start up the dancing. He asked immediately if she and Tarrie—a nimble, beautiful dancer well known for her light foot—would accompany him to start. Tarrie’s expression when he asked confused him, but he let it alone. Rosie rolled her eyes. Tarrie eyed Frodo like a pile of jewels. Had Rosie not known Sev’s thoughts on Frodo, she might or might not have been a little disgusted by the sugar-coated way she accepted Frodo’s hand.  
Sev entered as the dancing began. She avoided the front gate, for Bilbo handed out gifts to every attendee, and Sev didn’t enjoy crowds, much less gifts from one who felt nothing individual of them. She sat against the sidelines until Bilbo spotted her.  
“Seville! There you are!”  
Sev smiled at him somewhat uncertainly. “Good evening, Master Baggins, and a happy birthday to you.”  
“Just Bilbo for tonight, my dear,” he said, embracing her. She uneasily embraced him back, but he didn’t seem to notice. “Pippin has been looking for you. Go on in, enjoy yourself, my girl!”  
Sev glanced away and spotted Sam, who had situated himself at a nearby table and sipped ale while he tried not to stare over his shoulder at Rosie. Sev watched Frodo, lost in the dancing and enjoying himself immensely. She watched, entranced as they gracefully engaged in a great series of dances she wanted nothing more than to join . . . with Frodo.  
Then, after a few minutes, she noted Frodo dancing with Tarrie. A girl, Sev knew, who liked Frodo a great deal, and could dance far better than Sev could. She flicked her gaze away as Tarrie eyed Frodo flirtatiously: the girl wasn’t unpleasant by any means, and if Frodo liked her she deserved it. Frodo himself didn’t notice at all. He simply enjoyed himself dancing and appreciated Tarrie’s talent, not particularly thinking too much of it further. He knew little of the girl, and didn’t feel a burning desire to learn more.  
To keep her mind off of Frodo Sev approached Sam, standing right behind him on the opposite side of the table. She slipped around the table and sat right next to him.  
“Sam,” she said.  
Sam glanced up. “Oh. Hello, Ms. Sev.”  
She grinned, hoping she could get somewhere tonight. “So where’s Rosie?”  
Sam stared at the table, looking a little shocked. “Uh . . . dancing, I think.” Sev subsequently looked for Rosie . . . but only saw Frodo, his hair bouncing wildly and his smile shedding warmth and carefree excitement into Sev.  
“An amazing dancer, isn’t she?” Sev said wistfully, trying to focus on Sam. She couldn’t look at Frodo. Sam simply nodded, throwing his conviction into his ale.  
Frodo then spotted Sam, who flicked his eyes at Rosie. Frodo leaped away from the dancers, partially to take a break but not entirely. Until he sat down he didn’t see Sev, and her warmth shocked him. A shiver ran up his spine as he sandwiched between her and Sam. She slid over, surprised, but glad to see him finally. Somehow all of her bitterness with him melted away just to have his bouncy light nearby, but her heart flared, leaping up and down even as she sat back to give herself room to think.  
“Go on, Sam!” Frodo insisted. “Ask Rosie for a dance!”  
Sam turned to his mug for support, but nothing remained. “Uh . . . actually, I think I’ll just have another ale.”  
Both Frodo and Sev widened their eyes. Frodo grabbed Sam before he could go anywhere. “Oh, no you don’t!” Then he turned him towards Rosie and shoved him at her. “Go on!” Rosie grabbed Sam, and they whirled away while Sam attempted to get his feet. Frodo and Sev both burst out laughing excitedly.  
Frodo’s pulse raced as he held out his hand to Sev, and her stomach erupted into butterflies when she saw his open palm and welcoming fingers out in front of her.  
“Come on, Sev; let’s make sure poor Sam doesn’t die of joy just yet.”  
Sev felt she would die of joy, if anyone, as she accepted his hand. The warmth tingled up Frodo’s arm, and he led her away into the throng of dancers. Sev simply enjoyed herself, having practiced and now knew what went on through the steps. Frodo found himself a little surprised at how she had improved since the last time they danced. But soon he found exchange dances in small groups to be his favorite: whenever he grabbed Sev’s hand, shivers of warmth raced up his arm and sizzled against his head.  
After what felt to both as too short a time, however, Frodo could see Bilbo beckoning to him. That and Frodo needed to rest; he told the latter to Sev, and she nodded, breathless. She felt she wanted one too, even if it meant letting go of Frodo. Her lungs heaved. He moved to pick her up and set her down on a chair to rest, but when his arms circled her, she took it for an embrace.  
She wrapped her arms around his neck, breathing hard against his shoulders. His eyes widened as her warmth overwhelmed him to the core, and he embraced her back. Both realized they had never embraced before, and it flickered through him with a new excitement; Sev simply wondered at the change.  
“Thank you, Frodo,” she said. Then she turned away, struggling to remain standing as overwhelming giddiness overtook her. She sat behind a nearby tent and decided to breathe a little, much less rest. Frodo, having just released her, stood there in pause for a moment or two, trying to decide what had just snapped within him. He wanted to hold her again.  
And he didn’t understand it, so he refused his own internal request.  
Besides, Frodo could hear Lobelia behind him as he approached Bilbo. Sev watched her as she made her way towards Bilbo and Frodo, calling out the former’s name. Bilbo suddenly turned, grabbing Frodo hard. “It’s the Sackville-Bagginses!” he hissed, and Frodo turned him around, directing him through the crowds of hobbits over to the tent where Sev had ducked behind.  
Sev frowned up at them, although they could not see her behind the fabric. Her hiding spot; they couldn’t have it. Six more inches back, and Frodo might have stepped on her.  
They huddled in the back of the tent as Lobelia and her son passed by. Sev watched an initial grin overshadow Frodo’s face, and she settled while she watched, cocking her head. Something about Frodo she always wondered at: his smile, how it appeared regardless of whether he needed it. Because she always needed one, and he almost always had one. She wondered what life could feel like to be able to smile all the time.  
Frodo watched as the Sackville-Bagginses left. Bilbo turned to him, inhaling and exhaling slowly. “Thank you, my lad.” Frodo and Sev turned to Bilbo, and his solemnity surprised the former. Sev knew he planned to leave; she wondered if she ought to tell Frodo or if Bilbo would finally confess now. “I am very selfish. Yes, very selfish! I don’t know why I took you in after your father and mother died, but it wasn’t out of charity.”  
Frodo just stared at him, trying hard not to stop him and ask him what on Earth he meant.  
“I think it was because, of all my distant relations, you were the one Baggins who showed real spirit.”  
Sev nodded in affirmation to herself. She knew Bilbo’s relatives. No one could match up to Frodo.  
Frodo lifted an eyebrow. Perhaps Bilbo had gotten drunk, or had finally just gone plain nuts. “Bilbo, have you been at the Gaffer’s home brew?”  
Bilbo shook his head. “No. Well, y-yes, but . . . but that’s not the point! The point is, Frodo—oh, you’ll be all right.” He buried his face in his huge mug for a moment before turning away, possibly to gather his wits before his speech started.  
Frodo simply stood, utterly baffled. And he wondered at Bilbo . . . wondered if he would continue to settle into quiet, non-threatening madness until he passed away peacefully. Or if he would pursue what he fantasized about and actually leave.  
Sev squawked out of jocose habit when Frodo turned, nearly stepping on her. She rolled out of the way while Frodo jolted in shock. He glanced down, seeing her flopped over on the grass, staring up at him with wide eyes.  
“Sev!” He sat down, cross-legged, next to her. She wondered if he would be upset at her eavesdropping (however accidental his hiding in her claimed isolation place had been), but he only hoped she could help. She sat up when he lowered himself to the ground, and she sidled closer. It became close enough that Frodo felt the surging temptation to lift her hand from her lap and keep it locked in his fingers. But he let it go, simply shuffling where he sat. It would have been an advantageous moment for him to have Sev not be oblivious, and yet she somehow managed not to notice his twitching hands that he had to wrap together.  
“What do you think of Bilbo lately?” he asked as casually as he could.  
Sev cocked her head, processing for a minute, sorting through what she thought she had obligation and capability to tell him. Finally she decided, “Only what I’ve heard.” Bilbo confided in her his desire to go back and see Laketown, the Lonely Mountain . . . places she’d heard of in Frodo’s stories. So until she knew she could say anything to him of the subject so long as she didn’t dare share anything directly.  
Then Bilbo had grabbed her shoulders, locked her eyes on his and said, “I know you care for Frodo, my girl. Look after him. Keep him safe.” She promised she would, disbelieving how she had just been given stewardship over the one creature in the universe she had managed to truly love.  
Sev blinked at the memory, biting back emotions rolling inside her core. Frodo simply glanced at the ground following her response. “He’s up to something,” he muttered.  
Sev opened her mouth, almost letting “So you told Gandalf” slip out, but she didn’t know how well that would go over, either. She hesitated, rolling words around in her mouth. Frodo watched as her expression and eyes shifted, the latter shutting and opening, trying to find what she wanted to say. “Bilbo never really wanted to be kept in the Shire,” she said finally. “He may or may not leave, but whatever he told you he obviously doesn’t want to be here.” She leaned forward, and Frodo’s pulse raced when he considered she would put her hand on his shoulder, perhaps over his own. “Frodo, if he leaves it’s for the greater good of his happiness.”  
Sev didn’t touch him, and Frodo felt a sigh building up in his lungs. He let it out with his next words: “Maybe he will leave. Maybe he won’t.” At least Sev had assured him, despite her obvious belief that Bilbo would in fact depart the Shire, it would be for the greater good. Regardless, Frodo feared losing the only family he had, or ever knew. Frodo stood. “His speech should be starting soon.”  
He had been about to offer her a hand up, but with circumstances of touch being what they were, he knew he would never let go, and Sev would perhaps slap him and hiss before running away when she got tired of him. Sev stood as well, and followed him some distance behind Bilbo.  
Then a crack and a shriek sounded, and Sev whirled around to see a tent lifting into the air. It exploded some nine hundred yards above the ground, then sparked into the shape of a vicious dragon before rounding back over the party. Hobbits leaped over tables and ducked under chairs as the firework approached.  
“Frodo, get down!” Sev leaped over ducking hobbits as Frodo turned back to see the dragon approaching them.  
“Bilbo,” he said. “Bilbo! Watch out for the dragon!”  
“Dragon?” Bilbo sputtered. Sev grabbed Frodo’s shoulder to pull him down; Bilbo wouldn’t understand fast enough. The warmth shocked Frodo into every tense muscle slacking back. “There hasn’t been a dragon in these parts for a thousand years—!” Even as Frodo collapsed under Sev’s weight, Bilbo came down with them, and the dragon soared over, snapping and crackling into the distance. When it exploded into a shower of color, the hobbits all began to cheer. Frodo, overtaken by the shock of the firework and the immense need to turn around and hold Sev to him, began to laugh as well.  
Sev turned, still confused, and spotted Gandalf twisting the ears of Pippin and Merry. She could barely hear what he said, but she knew. She watched, amused, as he dragged them over to the dishes and set them washing. Sev scrambled away from Frodo, for which he felt confusedly grateful. The warmth departed his shoulder, and he shivered. He stood Bilbo up and hesitantly stood to follow Sev.  
She got lost in the crowd too fast, so Frodo simply began righting chairs (along with Sam’s help) in preparation for Bilbo’s speech. Sev and Rosie passed out mugs of ale to those already seated. Frodo watched them, and when Sev offered him a mug, she nudged his shoulder. Admittedly, however he took it, Sev meant it as more of an affectionate gesture, but knew he probably wouldn’t see it as such, and so felt emotionally safe. But Frodo—while he never would have taken it in affection—wanted her to come back the moment her warmth left. Unable to touch it, he set the mug aside and nervously clasped his fingers.  
Sev avoided going anywhere near Frodo’s table, but Rosie somehow managed to corral her into only serving the hobbits within Frodo’s vicinity. So she sucked in a breath and plunged into it, eyes trying not to flicker nervously towards him as she handed out ale.  
When Rosie and Sev had finished, relatively drunk hobbits began calling out for a “hesitant” Bilbo to give his speech. Even as he approached the barrels at the head of the tables, he gave a rather show-like resistance.  
“Speech! Speech!” Frodo joined the chanting and applauded. Sev watched from the very back, stepping about nervously as she couldn’t decide if she could or should approach Frodo. Even as Bilbo stepped up to begin his speech, Frodo turned, wishing he hadn’t been looking for anything in particular, and spotted Sev. Despite himself, he gestured for her to come forward. Sev’s heart skipped; she knew what he would do, but somehow she couldn’t prepare herself enough for it. As she slipped through the crowds of hobbits, she could feel her pulse escalating.  
Frodo’s did nothing of the sort until he remembered he had stopped thinking about her casually. When she sat down next to him, he initially (as friends do) put his arm around her shoulders. Sev stiffened, for she had been expecting this, anticipating it even. But Frodo didn’t realize until he had already done it. Her warmth flooded his arm, and he had to strain not to pull her closer. He fidgeted, managing to somehow get nearer to her.  
“My dear Bagginses and Boffins!” Bilbo began. Cheers arose at the mention of every last name as the speech progressed; Frodo noticed Sev only cheered for the first. While there were not many under the name Proudfoots, a stirring reaction followed. “Today is my 111th birthday!” Bilbo announced, after which arose even more cheers.  
“Eleventy-one years is certainly not enough time to live among such excellent and admirable hobbits,” he continued. More cheering. “Although, I don’t know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve!” Frodo and Sev both tensed with bubbling chuckles, and he could feel it. She didn’t laugh outright, and neither did he, but it was all there. Sev shook her head and rolled her eyes as she imagined who Bilbo could be talking about.  
Hopefully Bilbo appreciated that.  
“I regret to announce,” Bilbo continued, sobering, “that this is the end! I’m leaving now.” Frodo stiffened, and his arm tightened around Sev’s shoulders. She wouldn’t have been as apprehensive as Frodo if she didn’t revel in his arm around her, and wanted to smack herself for enjoying it so much. Bilbo glanced into his eyes, stirring something deep down that Frodo had known was coming. Sev realized then that it had grown too late to warn Frodo.  
“Goodbye.”  
Then Bilbo abruptly vanished. A collective gasp arose, but Frodo’s eyes remained wide and trained where Bilbo had disappeared. The ring, perhaps. Then he turned to Sev, about to ask her if she knew anything, but he only caught a flash of her glare before hobbits crowded him, all yelling questions. He stood to quiet them, and Sev vanished too, slinking off into the crowd with a dark hiss. The crowds overwhelmed her. She wanted to help, but she had already failed. She could do nothing.  
She slinked out of the gate and up to Bag End, where she had seen Gandalf run off to. No doubt he knew Bilbo had gone back up to collect his things. She heard snippets of conversation, something about the Ring. She heard dilations in Bilbo’s voice, and she grew afraid until he walked out the door. She almost felt a little bitter for Bilbo hadn’t exactly said goodbye to Frodo. She almost wanted to march up and demand it of him.  
Bilbo embraced Gandalf and turned to leave, but as Sev crept forward she could clearly hear his response. “I’ve thought of an ending to my book,” he said. “And he lived happily ever after, to the end of his days.”  
Gandalf smiled and laid a hand on Bilbo’s shoulder. “I’m sure you will, Bilbo Baggins.”  
Sev slipped out of her shadows and embraced Bilbo, which caught them both off guard.  
“Until later, Master Bilbo,” she said, backing away as she bowed to him. She loved formality more than comfortable affection, typically speaking.  
Bilbo tilted her chin up, and he gazed into her eyes fondly. “Look after Frodo,” he said. “I know how much you love him, don’t think I haven’t seen it happening over the last few years.” He tapped the side of his head. “Sometimes we Bagginses need help with love, my dear Sev. Just a little push and you’ll have him. He likes you too.”  
“I’ll watch him, Bilbo,” she said. “I promise.”  
“I’m sure you will.”  
With that he walked down, humming, from Bag End, never to return to the Shire. It might have been sad . . . if he’d actually loved the Shire. Until he saw the rest of the world he did, but now nothing could keep the hobbit from loving so much more than home.  
Sev waved to Gandalf and raced back down to the party. Hopefully Frodo had gotten everything cleared up, at least enough to let Sev function as she tried to help.

Frodo sent everyone out the front gate once Bilbo had disappeared. Most were drunk and stumbled out without complaint. The women and children were relatively sober, and they directed their according fathers and brothers home.  
But so heavy were the crowds that Frodo sagged exhaustedly against the fence once they were all gone. Rosie, Sam, Pippin, and Merry remained, the latter having been ordered to remain at dishes by Gandalf before he disappeared. The five of them began clearing the party field, knowing what they didn’t do at night they would have to do the following morning. Besides, it wouldn’t take too much effort for hobbits accustomed to working.  
Frodo watched, somewhat amused, as Rosie attempted to help Sam with whatever task he assigned himself. Sam would turn violent red as their hands brushed repeatedly, and soon he would have to go and try something else. Eventually Rosie let him go, smiling after him as he began packing up huge, heavy stacks of tables and chairs.  
Sev slipped through the gate, and when Frodo saw her he initially thought of her as he did Sam or Pippin . . . until he remembered she meant more to him. He blinked and turned away.  
As Sev began to help, more of the field cleared. She zipped from one end to another, focused hard on one task until it finished. So Rosie abandoned the general field to wash dishes. She dismissed Merry and Pippin, who drunkenly bowed graciously, repeatedly, as they backed away to home. Pippin slung his arm around Sev’s shoulder and kissed her cheek. While sensitive to touch, Sev accepted it as a flirtation and nudged him back. Frodo bit his lip and moved on while Pippin and Merry departed. He wondered how those two could get away with everything and he somehow managed never to have the initiative.  
As Sev watched Sam and Rosie, she realized his blush could only mean that things had gone too well during the dance to let Rosie approach him. They’d probably conversed, making Sam happy until he realized Rosie might think less of him than he wanted. Frodo saw Sev growing fidgety, although he didn’t understand why until she finally threw her hands in the air, grabbed Sam’s shoulder, and marched him over to Rosie. Sam resisted her, but he could only do so much; Sam would never hurt a woman. And Frodo knew Sev appreciated (and utilized) that.  
Rosie glanced up, anticipatory. Sam quieted suddenly as Sev set him down in front of the dishwashing barrels. “Sam would like to help, if it isn’t too much trouble.”  
Sam’s composure threatened to erupt when Rosie accepted, and Sev thrust him into dishwashing. Frodo chuckled, turning back to the lights, the last part of it all. Sev beat him to the tree, determined to take them down herself. He didn’t dare chase or challenge her; it would cause too much stir in his heart, somehow. She looped lights around her arms as she descended from one branch to the next.  
When she reached the ground, the lights were strung just beyond her reach, just how Frodo had hung them. While they were the same height, Sev refused to stand up high on the balls of her feet. She didn’t trust the length of them. She had lived for 38 years without big feet, and once she had them she never got used to them. So Frodo had actually strung the lights earlier so he could lift her to get them, but now things were a little too tense in his mind to actually do such a thing.  
He helped her regardless, he could do as much. Once she had gotten down from the tree she tried to stand up to grab lights, so he stood behind her, pulling them off the metal hooks he had set up. He handed her the lights, and she looped them around her elbow as they continued. But the night grew cold, and Sev’s warmth drew him nearer to her by the second. She didn’t get apprehensive; she didn’t notice. But she felt she suddenly understood Sam’s fear and silence, having Frodo so close.  
Soon an inch lay between Frodo’s shoulder and Sev’s.  
“Did you enjoy yourself?” Sev asked despite the intense attack of her pulse on the rest of her.  
Frodo didn’t think he did more than speak, but having his voice over her shoulder made Sev lurch just a little bit, and she had to strain to keep moving. “Very much,” Frodo said. “Although sometimes I worry about Bilbo and his jokes. Something’s going wrong.”  
Sev opened her mouth to tell him, but she stepped back from having just pulled off a loop when he stepped forward to grab another, and his shoulder met hers. Every muscle within her froze. Her warmth flooded Frodo, sizzling against his brain. He didn’t want to move—and he didn’t have to.  
“Sev?” he asked, hoping she hadn’t noticed his hesitation. Then he noticed her pause. Her head lowered, turning to face him but not quite able. Her mouth opened, and she shook herself, turning back to him. “Nothing,” she said. “I’m fine.”  
But even as she looked at him, neither could move. He studied her: the black blood in her eyes, somehow accenting the brightness of deep blue in her irises. Her lips suddenly didn’t look terrifying . . . just evident. He watched her, noticing her hands . . . things he hadn’t cared about before. Somehow Sev stood before him, but not the Seville he had found under the log. This was a woman, and he found he liked her.  
For Sev it only carried more emotional weight. His face had not changed—she had loved him long enough. Like he had, she noticed his eyes first, but when they met hers her gaze flickered away for a brief moment. But when they turned their gaze she could look at them. His hair, the contours of his nose and jaw. His lips, right there, right where she could reach them if she leaned forward but three inches (the gap slowly closed to two). She wondered what it would feel like to kiss him, but held it back. Did he ever wonder?  
She broke away, but he didn’t notice until her warmth had left and the chill of the night breached against him. Sev wandered, as everything had been done after Sam and Rosie concluded washing, and he couldn’t back away fast enough. Rosie turned and smiled at Sev, then nodded to Frodo. She sighed, somewhat wistful. Sev felt for her, but Frodo couldn’t have understood.  
“I must be back home,” Rosie said. “Good night, Frodo; Seville; Samwise.”  
Frodo and Sev both responded, glancing at Sam to watch what he would do. His eyes flickered to Rosie for a brief moment, wishing to get caught in a stare. He refused them, and his gaze drifted away.  
“A good night to you, Ms. Cotton,” he muttered.  
Rosie laughed, making his ears turn pink, and turned toward home. Sam waited until she had walked a safe distance away, then shuffled out the front gate after saying goodbye to Sev and Frodo.  
Sev rubbed her arm, both for the cold night and trying to protect her mind from her feelings for Frodo. He wondered then if her own heat affected her, or if she couldn’t feel it. He’d asked Bilbo about the unnatural warmth once, but the older hobbit just stared at him as though he were drunk when he brought it up. Frodo couldn’t help but be confused.  
Tension built up within Sev, and she casually sighed, flopping onto the grass. Frodo laughed, and she did too as she realized he didn’t think as deeply about “them” as she did.  
Frodo noted, as she laughed, that while he never initially found it the most beautiful laugh he didn’t want to hear anything else. It made him feel as though he’d made a mark. And Sev did funny things sometimes; it reminded him of her character in general. Despite himself, he settled down into the grass next to her. The warmth of her head rubbed against him, although he laid down at least six inches away.  
The tension rose again for Sev. Then she internally slapped herself. Frodo only meant to spend time with a friend, not talk about future plans and current feelings with a special girl. Perhaps he never would . . . leastwise not with her.  
“You’re 33, Frodo,” Sev said at last. She came across as ambivalent, at least to Frodo, which irked him a little bit. He wanted to know what she thought, so he could act accordingly.  
Frodo nodded. His hair shifted against her own, and the warmth rubbed on his head. He had to back away; he needed to think, and having the warmth against him wouldn’t help.  
“Are you frightened?” she continued.  
Frodo shook his head; also a mistake on his part. He resolved he didn’t want to move away, and so didn’t shift again. “Not really,” he said. He hoped Sev didn’t see the lie; he did fear liking her. It made no sense to like her, until he broke it down and realized he wanted her badly enough. His statement only made Sev cringe a little; she had hoped he would say something nonchalant about courting, but he didn’t. “There’s not much to be afraid of in the Shire, Sev, even turning 33.” Then he chuckled, thinking about when Bilbo went on about the Lonely Mountain. “I guess Bilbo’s something to be afraid of.”  
“And Gandalf.” Frodo could sense humor building up within her; Sev shoved it back.  
“And poor Sam,” Frodo continued. “Let’s hope he doesn’t kill us all once we’ve made him blush so much.”  
They both burst out laughing, Sev a little harder than Frodo to the extent of rolling over onto her face on purpose to keep it all in. Soon her sides hurt, and she curled into a ball. Frodo laughed somewhat to keep from thinking about her too hard, but it didn’t seem to help. Sev tried to slow to a halt, but her squeaky, intermittent attempt threw Frodo into laughing again.  
“Frodo,” she gasped. “I can’t be laughing anymore . . .” It only spurred him on. She slipped her eyes closed in jocose disdain, and accordingly then shoved her hand over his eyes. While he only meant to be casual, neither could take it so easily. Frodo’s face heated beneath her hand; the warmth rubbed against him, and his eyes drifted shut. Sev’s fingers twitched over his face, wishing to cup his cheek. But she knew it would only drive her to kiss him if she did, and she pulled away slowly. Even as she did Frodo lifted his own hand to pull hers back. The brush of their fingers stopped him, and she halted in place to see what he would do.  
He studied her fingertips, his own tracing across them as he watched the pale skin and the black veins. So frightening, and yet familiar, warm, enough to make him understand why he wanted them.  
“Crazeball,” she muttered, snapping them both out of it. She hastily ruffled his hair and stood, abruptly righting in a rigid stance. He laughed when he thought of other times she had ruffled his hair, times before this relationship—friendship, he corrected himself—had become too confusing for him to handle.  
Sev chuckled when he laughed, but then pain shot through her stomach. She grabbed it, fearing the sore sides (however pleasant the memories they were associated with) that would be horrid later, much less when she awakened the next day.  
“I’ll be bleeding from the stomach in the morning if I laugh anymore,” she admitted. Frodo conceded to let it alone, and she stood to go home. Glancing at the position of the rising moon, Frodo gathered he had to leave as well. When Sev turned to go back to her log, she opened her mouth to say good night, but Frodo stood and followed her, curious about where she lived. Then he could find her if dancing—or anything else important, for that matter—came up again. She’d probably been there all day.  
They did end up coming right back to the log. Sev turned to Frodo as she knelt down next to the hole.  
“Good night, Frodo. And happy birthday!” She smiled somewhat wistfully and ducked down. She didn’t know what to do now. He just stared at her and the log a little strangely.  
“This is where you sleep, then?” he asked. No family, and she’d lived under a log this entire time.  
Sev realized he might have been looking for her the whole day, had come to get her for the party and hadn’t known where to look. She shoved the notion away; he knew she liked her log. In theory he would have come for her there anyway, so he had to have forgotten. Regardless, she spoke jocosely. “How did you not know this?”  
Frodo lifted an eyebrow. “You never exactly say where you go after sunset. You never ran around with us—,”  
“For a good reason,” Sev interjected, slapping her forehead against the wall of ground nearby. Frodo didn’t push the matter; she had tried to explain to him why she didn’t join him and his friends during games at night, although Frodo always thought they were harmless. Knew they were harmless; Bilbo joined them at times, and they had enjoyed mud fights and things. But Sev adamantly refused. She had seen bundles of shirts discarded, probably for no reason other than to cool off in the night air, but she refused to peek out of her hole.  
Frodo bent over, curious about what state she lived in. He folded his arms over the ground as he had 13 years before and gazed down inside.  
He moved so abruptly that Sev had no idea how to react. She couldn’t have guessed his motives until he had already laid against the ground, and so she did not move. The chair behind her trapped her in place. Her face remained frozen an inch away from his own. She gaped, not daring to breathe for fear she would lean too far forward and her lips would brush his cheek. The temptation to do so overwhelmed her, so she bit it back, fighting herself.  
Frodo’s pulse rose, and his face warmed at the nearness of her cheek to his own. He didn’t look at her, rather studied the decently furnished home Sev lived in. She’d packed the dirt hard along the walls, or so it appeared, over time. He fingered the side, and a few loose flecks crumbled at his touch. One couch opposite Frodo, tattered and beaten, had her shape rubbed into the fabric. It didn’t look comfortable.  
Frodo pulled away finally, and Sev could breathe again. He glanced up at her, and her eyes caught on his own. She couldn’t look away if she wanted. “We have couches up at Bag End more comfortable than this, if you wanted to come up.” He almost couldn’t believe his own offer, simply for never having offered her anything in the way of comfort beyond his friendship. But she thought more of that than he knew.  
Sev didn’t quite know how to react. Frodo watched her, a little concerned for what her response might be. She almost leaped on the offer, until she realized it would be her and Frodo alone, as Bilbo had left. So she almost declined . . . and then remembered Gandalf had come.  
“That would be wonderful,” she said, her smile growing sincerely. “Thank you, Frodo.”  
Frodo’s spirits lifted as he pulled away and offered her his hand; he realized, moments before she took it, how his motivations were not only to bring her out of the log but to take her hand. She slipped her fingers into his grasp, and warm tingles danced up his arm. He hesitated for a moment, and Sev wondered why. But when the shivers halted and Sev’s hand remained warm like the glow of a fire in his own, he pulled her from the log.  
He didn’t release her hand as they raced up the hill to Bag End, and Sev didn’t pull away. She found it convenient to have his hand: beyond being a little dizzy at holding it, she lagged behind him sometimes, but he had the strength to keep her level with him.  
Once they neared Bag End, Sev opened her mouth to tell Frodo about Bilbo . . . but he could already feel something wrong. His fingers absentmindedly slipped out of her hand, and he shivered with the sudden onslaught of cold. He leaped forward to the door, opening it quickly. Even if Bilbo had stayed, he needed to let him know Sev would be staying.  
“Bilbo!” he called out. But as he stepped across the threshold, he felt something, a whisper perhaps. He glanced down and took a step back as he saw Bilbo’s ring. Sev approached him from behind, but the moment she saw the ring the burning pains took over. She collapsed to the ground, writhing in place; Frodo didn’t notice, and she hadn’t the strength to ask for help. Her heart thudded mercilessly in her ears, slamming against every pulse throughout her body. This ring carried a weight she didn’t understand.  
Frodo stepped over to Gandalf, seated by the fire and smoking. “He’s gone, isn’t he?” Frodo asked. “He talked for so long about leaving . . . but I didn’t think he’d actually do it.” He remembered the sincerity in Bilbo’s eyes when he had bid Frodo goodbye at the party.  
Gandalf did not respond.  
“Gandalf?” Frodo asked, holding out the ring. Sev staggered to the front step, gripping the doorway as she tried not to breathe so hard as to alert Frodo. He had other things to worry about.  
Gandalf looked down at Frodo’s hand, then with an uneasy grin said, “Bilbo’s ring! He’s gone to stay with the Elves. And he’s left you Bag End.” Gandalf stood and held an envelope out to Frodo, who uncertainly slipped the ring inside. Gandalf hastily took back the envelope and sealed it before handing it back to Frodo. Frodo wondered at the necessity of a separate container, but slipped it back into place on the mantle regardless.  
Before Sev could step inside, Gandalf began gathering his things. “I must go now,” he said urgently.  
Sev and Frodo both began to protest. “Why?” Sev insisted.  
Gandalf halted when he spotted her in the doorway, but as he grabbed his hat and staff he responded. “I have questions,” he insisted. “Questions that need answering!” He turned abruptly to depart.  
“But you’ve only just arrived!” Frodo said.  
Gandalf continued to throw them off until he reached the door. “I don’t understand,” Frodo persisted, standing just behind Gandalf. The wizard turned to face the hobbit.  
“Neither do I,” he said, his voice having grown grim. He laid a hand on Frodo’s shoulder; it felt heavier than it ought. “Keep it secret.” His tone dropped to a sharp whisper. “Keep it safe.” Then he turned, closing the door behind him. Frodo didn’t know entirely what to do with himself for a moment, shocked at the departure of both Bilbo and Gandalf . . . abruptly and on the same night.  
The moment Gandalf’s voice grew solemn Sev knew something had changed, something she wanted to break now. She didn’t know what to do. Gandalf grabbed her shoulders and shook them.  
“Guard him, Seville,” he insisted. “Don’t let him out of your sight, and don’t let him use that ring.” Then he paused; everything about him darkened seriously. “Keep him safe.”  
Sev felt conviction rising within her. Someone else finally understood Frodo’s value. Then she realized, though, how Gandalf concerned himself more with the affairs of the ring. She didn’t care about the ring, as long as it didn’t hurt Frodo.  
“Yes, sir,” she said.  
Gandalf smiled a little, patted her shoulder, and turned away to leave. He had slipped down the path and back to his horse before she could react much.  
Sev glanced into Bag End. Frodo stared at the envelope, still lost in thought. She growled a little. Gandalf had said not to let him put it on, and she would persist. She didn’t know why it would be an issue, despite Frodo turning invisible, but refused to trust her ignorance.  
She looked around, uncertain. She could go back to her log, but no one would be at Bag End to keep an eye on Frodo. He turned to see her walking back down the steps, but he didn’t want to be alone, and almost reached out for her. But Sev nestled into the grass, far softer than her beaten, old couch, from a perfect place to watch Frodo. If danger arose she would go inside, but for now the lawn suited her perfectly.  
Frodo began dragging a couch from the front room to the door, but set it to the side to see if she would at least come in to use it. It’d be right by the door, so hopefully any qualms she had could be remedied. But he didn’t count on it.  
As he opened the door, Sev watched the stars, naming them after people they reminded her of. She had found a beautiful cluster she wanted to call Frodo’s Eyes, but she refused herself the idea. If he ever asked about stars—not very likely, but possible—her initial response would be the death of her.  
“Sev?”  
She turned to see Frodo coming towards her.  
“You know, the point of coming up here is to use one of the couches,” he said.  
She nodded, and the grass around her head weaved across her face, tickling her nose. She sat up. “But Gandalf is gone. I will not come in.”  
Frodo gathered she would be adamant. So he shrugged; he couldn’t change her mind. “All right. But at least take one.” He almost thought, Bilbo won’t mind, but Frodo owned Bag End. He could give couches and food and books to Sev as he wished. His home could somehow become hers, he realized. So Bilbo might have left . . . but Frodo found family almost infinitely more powerful, family he’d befriended of his own will, not by blood ties.  
He grabbed the head of the couch, but Sev leaped up and put her hands about the back of it.  
“I said I cannot come in,” she said, “but if it’s all the same to you, sleeping on the lawn would be nicer than the log.” She didn’t want to leave him, and hoped he wouldn’t mind having her out here. It almost felt like she had family when she had responsibility for someone. It sent tingles up her back.  
Frodo initially grinned; Sev wondered if he noticed when he smiled. Probably not, for otherwise he wouldn’t do it every time he greeted a young hobbit lady . . . anyone familiar with Frodo’s smile would know the blush and flutters a girl faced in a situation of such. Sev had felt such flutters a long time ago, but now it just melted her heart to see something so bright and happy. “I suppose that should be all right,” he said.  
Together they lined the couch on the grass. Frodo almost wanted to turn it about so he could see her—the tall back faced Bag End—but she sat down before he could say anything.  
She said good night again, but suddenly Frodo felt the gap of Bilbo’s absence. On nights when Frodo felt his spirits lift, or on nights when he had been deeply embedded in conversation with Sev, he always kissed Bilbo’s forehead before retiring, allowing some form of what he considered rather extreme catharsis. But Bilbo had gone.  
Of course, Frodo already decided he had more family.  
Despite his self-assurances that Sev couldn’t take this the wrong way, Frodo realized he would. He’d take it as a sign of attraction to her. He tried to resist the idea even as he sat down, facing her. Sev eyed him carefully, and he could only imagine the shifting expressions on his face. Sev just watched his eyes flicker over her, and she wondered what he could be thinking. Her wondering, as well as all of her other mental processes, halted suddenly when he carefully laid his hands about her face. She had envisioned this so many times in the past she didn’t quite know how to handle the reality of it.  
Before Frodo could change his mind (although the internal battle waged consistently), he pulled her just a small bit closer and gently kissed her forehead. Warmth shot through him in excited shivers. While he only held it for a moment, Sev felt she might be in shock for a few days. Feeling Frodo’s soft lips against her for the first time, she realized her envisioning had downplayed him and the emotional effects of this situation. Although not much, this represented more than a simple peck, or so she felt and he knew.  
He broke away, and the warmth almost cut off completely. “Good night, Sev.”  
Baffled, Frodo hastily covered the step back up to Bag End and slipped inside, closing the door behind him. His hands shivered with the sudden chill. He remembered the shocks of warmth claiming passage through his core, dancing about like wild sparks. His face heated. He didn’t dare look back at her until he had safely secured himself within Bag End, but he couldn’t see her over the couch’s back.  
As for Sev, her lungs wouldn’t stop dragging in more breath in half a second than should have been possible. She wondered what he’d been thinking, but after a moment, when the dizziness of breathing so hard began to scatter, she realized he had probably done the same for Bilbo. And yet this felt special, perhaps for having never been kissed in any way before . . . save by Merry and Pippin, but they were very evidently flirtatious about it. Something here certainly carried more weight—as though she were his family. In any way, shape, or form, she would take it.  
Within Bag End, Frodo tore his thoughts from Sev back to the mantle. He stepped forward even as she stepped up to the window, eyeing him carefully. He slipped the envelope from its place. Sev’s heart raced as she watched, prepared to jump to the door and spring inside if he dared try and put it on. But he didn’t; he primarily considered how Sev and Gandalf both thought of the ring as dangerous, how neither liked the mention of it and seemed to fear it. Usually when they agreed one could assume they were both right. Rarely did Gandalf agree with Sev. The ring bound them in opinion for once.  
Frodo stepped over to a large trunk Bilbo had always kept for scrolls and things. Sev breathed a sigh of relief as he slipped the envelope into the bottom of the trunk, then shut the lid and stepped away.  
Sev backed off and lay back on the couch. Frodo began blowing out candles around Bag End.  
She watched, dazzled, as a pair of dark blue birds fluttered in a circle until they landed on her couch. Her couch, she realized . . . Frodo had given it to her. She leaned closer, and noticed one bird had a broken leg, limping about when it tried to stand. She fingered it, and it pecked at her skin very lightly. The other bird leaped onto Sev’s arm. Both were probably trying to hack in and get to her poison, release its toxins so it no longer existed. Sev sighed; at least they were helping each other. The whole bird helped the wounded one into the air when they both finally decided they weren’t going to be of much help.  
Sev lay against the soft, solid couch. Frodo slipped into bed only thinking the morning could be interesting enough.


	8. The One Ring

Frodo never woke up early enough to see Sev go anywhere, leastwise not when she lived beneath the log. Regardless he awakened some twenty minutes after sunrise and made breakfast for two, with plenty of chocolate; Sev did not take tea, and would accept chocolate as a substitute. He slipped out onto the lawn, hoping but not expecting to see her.  
When he got up close, he could see her still lying there, restlessly moaning a little as she seemed to relish the couch for comfort. He laughed to himself and set the tray of food down.  
He ate subconsciously while he watched her. She still intrigued him, even if the black blood of her eyes no longer had much to show in sleep. Sev condensed into a little ball, then spread herself all over the couch. Once she had stopped stretching, her eyes flickered open. As reality came in, she spotted breakfast . . . and her eyes shot wide open.  
Frodo wondered where she got food if she had no home . . . if she ever ate beyond her frequent visits to Bag End.  
Sev eyed the stack of food. Ravenous (although for wound sustenance, not for actual food), she leaned up and tensed to pounce. She knew jocosity would be her only tunnel into interacting with anyone, much less Frodo. And while faking her way through life hurt sometimes, after opening up Frodo could be a brilliant companion.  
Frodo chuckled and set the food down; he didn’t want to be dead just yet. Sev’s eyes followed the biscuits first, and she leaped from the couch, seated next to him, while she grabbed a biscuit and ate it as exaggeratedly as possible. Frodo laughed, and she lifted her eyebrows while she continued.  
Breakfast shot by, and following the finished food Frodo invited her inside to read. He watched her some of the time, took in some of his own information for the rest. Mostly, though, he watched her. They went inside to read, but Sev felt an urge to read out on a log above a stream, a very bookish place, of which there were many around the Shire. Frodo conceded, and as they walked Frodo wanted to take the hand dangling at Sev’s side. While that would not have been unusual for them, he knew his intentions had changed from friendship to something he didn’t understand. He shook it off and kept going.  
As they read, Sev grew a little exhausted apparently, and her eyes flickered open and shut.  
“Sev?”  
She glanced up at him and shook her head. She hadn’t drained anything in five weeks, and even so shaking Sam’s hand after he cut himself with a shovel hadn’t been on purpose. She had nothing, and she could feel her blood pulsing low.  
Regardless she shook her head, slowly and methodically. “I’m all right,” she muttered . . . and her head laid on his shoulder as she slept to prolong her own life.  
Frodo set the book aside, eyeing her, unaware of her dying. He wondered only for a second or two at his need to put his arm around her, and conceded the desire came resultant of wanting to protect his family. And how she looked so adorable when resting . . .  
His hand locked around her shoulder, and he shifted to let his other arm surround her. Her head limply lay against his chest, completely unaware. The warmth flooded Frodo, and he didn’t dare move.  
Sev’s body grew desperate, feeling Frodo’s potential for injury, and she trembled while the poison begged to flow out of her and kill Frodo if necessary to no longer exist. Frodo only held her harder, squeezing the poison into submission. Finally, after scouring for several minutes, Sev’s blood found a small papercut, perfectly capable of healing itself, between Frodo’s thumb and finger. Accustomed to not having much sustenance, the blood took as much from the small wound as possible, and soon Sev stirred.  
Frodo backed away as she sat up, looking a little frazzled. He ruffled her hair.  
She eyed the book. “I’m sorry,” she said, certain of why she had fallen asleep—ready to die—but not sure why she’d survived. “I suppose I’m simply tired suddenly.” She stretched, and Frodo slipped the book off of the log. They finished before afternoon tea; reading out loud Sev made a faster run than Frodo did alone.  
The event of almost dying haunted Sev . . . and she wondered how Frodo might have reacted if she did die there.  
For weeks, life went about the same way: they would read, eat, prank Merry and Pippin, coax Sam to Rosie, and spend nights at the Green Dragon together. Sev realized she had only become closer to Frodo, but she couldn’t have guessed her physical drain of any little injury he had whenever she grew close to death bonded them in a way no two other people—or hobbit and anti-creature—had ever been bonded before. Frodo kissed her forehead every night before retiring, and that strengthened the internal tie for him as well.  
One night at the Green Dragon seemed to change things for Frodo. While he’d always enjoyed the Green Dragon, there were nights when he wanted Sev there with him, drinking and dancing. She never would, he knew. He could see how much she enjoyed Rosie. He couldn’t help but want her down with them, though. She would say something sarcastic, blow Pippin through the roof with jokes and things.  
He didn’t want to desire her. And yet something about the last 13 years couldn’t be undone.  
This night he had been fighting his need for her to join them, had refused to look at her. But somehow he managed to catch Sev’s eyes, and he pulled to stand up and go talk to her; but he’d been with her for nine straight hours. He wondered where the need came from, but he resolved never to consider her again, not with how strong her pull seemed to him.  
Sev enjoyed watching at the Green Dragon, and loved Rosie’s company immensely. Although she didn’t know a fraction as much of Rosie as she did Frodo, she still thought Rosie perfectly comfortable. And she noticed while the girl watched Sam, rather wistfully.  
“What do you think of him?” Sev asked her once.  
Rosie washed the mug in her hands for the eighth time, too distracted to move on to anything else. Her gaze flickered to Sev; she’s been watching Sam. “What?”  
“Sam. What do you think?” Sev nodded to the young Gamgee, and she noted he tried to stare at Rosie as well.  
A blush and a smile rose to the other hobbit’s face. “He’s very sweet, and very good with growing things . . .” She trailed off, and Sev wondered if she would have listed vegetation as well as friendships and family; it would’ve been a very Rosie Cotton thing to do.  
Sev nodded encouragingly. “And . . .? Why haven’t you moved to befriend him more?” Sev gestured to Sam. “He doesn’t have the courage to do it himself, but he certainly likes you.”  
Rosie shook her head. Both girls looked up as Merry and Pippin crowed drunkenly to the rafters, teetering about on the table. Sev could hear Frodo singing as well, but that all halted when Merry slipped, grabbing Pippin and crashing down on Frodo. The tavern burst into laughter, the loudest being those who had fallen.  
The moment Sev’s eyes met Frodo’s, they both halted. Sev grasped the counter to stay in place, and Frodo tore his gaze away.  
Rosie looked back at Sam once the tavern quieted. “He’s too shy, and he’s still a boy. He’s not a man yet.”  
“How else would you test him?” Sev insisted. “He’s a sweet man, as you’ve pointed out.”  
Rosie sighed. “He’s too young in his heart, Seville. He has things to learn.”  
Sev cringed at the mention of her full name. Ever since Bilbo and Gandalf left, she hadn’t heard it from any but Rosie. That concept contributed (in a small way) to why she preferred Frodo’s company to anyone else’s.  
Sev reasoned with herself that, even if Rosie insisted Sam didn’t have the traits of a man quite yet, she still loved him. Every time he walked into the Green Dragon—with Frodo or Gaffer, depending on if Sev had come early—Rosie would perk up almost unnoticeably. Sev cackled to herself every time, although kept away from Rosie as not to hinder the reaction.  
Finally she considered a reply. “He’s no less than the rest of the hobbits, probably more.”  
Rosie shook her head. “I could never be with a typical hobbit.”  
“But you flirt with them—?”  
“I accept their words,” Rosie said, ever the pragmatic diplomat, “but I love none of them. Sam is more, but there is something troubling him, something I know is coming. How it will, I don’t know.”  
Sev still didn’t entirely understand, and wondered if Rosie even understood her own words.  
Three weeks later they were staring at each other again. Sev’s gaze shot between them until she could hear Frodo singing, and her eyes lifted as he danced around the table. Merry and Pippin were both semi-solidly locked onto the wooden rise, so they wouldn’t likely fall.  
Frodo didn’t dare turn around. He knew the moment he took ale from Rosie and began singing all eyes would turn to the table, possibly including Sev’s. He wanted to look at her, but didn’t dare risk it again.  
After the song finished, Sev turned back to work. She listened carefully as some of the older hobbits began to discuss rumors of war. Frodo only perked up, away from one table and headed to Sam’s, when he heard Gaffer: “You’re beginning to sound like that old Bilbo Baggins. Cracked, he was!”  
Another hobbit chuckled. “Young Mr. Frodo here; he’s crackin’!”  
Sev watched, curious, as Frodo turned with the ale he’d brought and set it down on the table. “And I’m proud of it! Cheers, Gaffer!” After all, Frodo gathered he’d have to be cracked to read every day . . . much less spend every minute of it with someone crazy like Sev. But he enjoyed the craziness somehow.  
Sev wondered at him being cracked, how she had never liked anyone less than eccentric.  
“Well, it’s none of our business what goes on beyond our borders!” Gaffer turned to Frodo. “Just keep your nose out of trouble, and no trouble will come to you!” Frodo nodded in affirmation and took a drink.  
Sev shook her head, eyebrows drawing together as she washed out mugs intently. The idea of Frodo in trouble haunted her. She sat back against the counter.  
She and Rosie took their places by the door, as Rosie felt socially capable enough to wish the men a good night as they departed. Sev always wished to go home, but knowing what drunk hobbits could do with themselves she didn’t want Rosie getting hurt. So she stood watch . . . and occasionally received a flirtation, usually from Merry or Pippin (most hobbits were too afraid of her to attempt). In theory she didn’t appreciate it; but as Frodo watched her—in practice—she couldn’t help but seem to enjoy it. But neither said anything as they left; both were a little too drunk.  
Frodo didn’t leave until almost the last of the hobbits had walked out. Sam didn’t want to leave either, if only for fearing Rosie standing at the door. So Sam and Frodo gravitated to opposite sides of the door, nervously stepping over the threshold. He smiled at Sev and wished Rosie a good night. Rosie turned to Sam with her farewell, and Sev seemed not to know where to turn.  
Soon, Nonno came to the door, and sweepingly descended to one knee before Rosie. Frodo and Sam turned back to watch. “Good night, sweet maiden of the golden ale!” he flourished. Sev resisted laughing while Rosie smiled, somewhat condescendingly, and thanked him.  
“Oi, watch who you’re sweetalking,” Sam muttered. Sev clamped her mouth shut.  
Frodo’s response only made her laugh harder. “Don’t worry, Sam,” he said in all honesty. “Rosie knows a nitwit when she sees one.”  
Sam stopped abruptly. “Does she?”  
Frodo laughed a little, pulling Sam forward with an arm around his shoulders. “You are no nitwit, Sam, anyone as good as Rosie could see that.” He clapped Sam’s shoulder, and the latter hobbit went stumbling home while Frodo ascended into Bag End.  
An overwhelming air of darkness greeted Frodo as he cautiously opened the door. Nothing looked amiss, and yet Frodo could feel a presence inside. He crept forward, only to have a hand grab his shoulder urgently. He spun around, and Gandalf’s exhausted face met him.  
“Is it safe?” the wizard hissed.  
Frodo lit a few candles and started up the fireplace before turning hastily to the chest. He didn’t understand Gandalf’s urgency, but didn’t want to push the wizard. He slipped the envelope out from the bottom and handed it to Gandalf; in turn the wizard abruptly threw it into the fireplace.  
“What are you doing?!” Frodo cried as the paper popped and hissed, pulling back to reveal the circlet of pure gold. The charring flakes quickly vanished, leaving the exposed metal while Gandalf carefully removed the ring with a pair of tongs. After inspecting it for a moment, he said, “Hold out your hand, Frodo.”  
Frodo turned to him, a little surprised. Gandalf held out the ring. “It’s quite cool,” he added.  
The hobbit hesitantly held out his hand. Gandalf dropped the ring into his palm; the icy chill of the metal surprised Frodo, and he flinched just a little.  
Gandalf set the tongs aside and walked a small distance away. “Do you see anything?”  
Frodo turned the ring over and over in his fingers. “Nothing,” he said. “There’s nothing—wait.” A few moments after he picked it up, sharp, fiery letters carved into the ring on all sides, glowing with a white fire. “It’s some kind of Elvish,” he said. “I can’t read it.”  
Gandalf’s tone grew grim and dark. “Very few can. The language is that of Mordor, which I will not utter here.”  
Frodo resisted gawking. “Mordor?”  
The wizard inhaled slowly. “In the common tongue it says, ‘One Ring to rule them all . . . One Ring to find them. One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.”  
Gandalf urged Frodo to make some tea, relax them both, before he launched into further explanation. “This is the One Ring.”  
As Gandalf revealed the history, Frodo realized Bilbo had found it in Gollum’s cave; the dormancy of the Ring, Gandalf told him, was ended. Before he could explain further, however, a sharp, urgent knock at the door silenced them both. Frodo exhaled; it sounded like Sev’s knock.  
~0~  
Sev watched Frodo and Sam walk away, listening to them talk about Rosie. As Rosie bid her a goodnight and pinched out the candles within the building, Sev wondered if she could ever be a Rosie for Frodo. At least, for Sam, he had mutual attraction. Sev had no such thing.  
And yet everything Frodo had done within the last year . . .  
“No attraction,” she muttered to herself. “Just friends.” But she couldn’t help thinking about those pauses when he took her hand, about being kissed on the forehead so softly, so very tenderly, every night. Her fingers and face tingled at the thought. She wondered when Frodo would grow an attachment, and how she would deal with it. “I guess I don’t have to worry about it until we get there—,”  
She kicked a pebble ahead of her on the path back to Bag End, but the whickering of a strong battle horse snapped her out of paralysis. She looked up to see a large, bay mare busily chewing grass in the party field, and her heart dropped with dread.  
“No,” she moaned, racing up the trail to Bag End. “No, no, no . . .” Anyone could be in there. She tried to assure herself some friend had come, but Gandalf would be the only possibility. No other friends of Frodo rode a horse half that size. She knocked rapidly, her palms already pricking, praying Frodo would be all right.  
“Come in,” Frodo said.  
Gandalf abruptly cut him off as Sev opened the door. “Frodo Baggins, visitors during a discussion of this nature—,”  
Sev slipped her head in; Frodo could feel himself sighing with relief, not only at having someone trustworthy inside but just for seeing her after this mess with the Ring. Gandalf paused. She stopped as well.  
“Seville?” he asked.  
She nodded, resigned to knowing she wouldn’t be welcome until they were finished. Gandalf lifted his hand to wave her inside, and she began to back out.  
“Come in, girl,” he said, shaking his head. “Tell me things have been all right.”  
Sev stepped inside. Frodo couldn’t help but feel something between the wizard and Sev had happened that he didn’t know of. She turned to Gandalf, eyeing the Ring and Frodo’s perplexed expression before responding.  
“Sev,” Gandalf said, growing somewhat impatient.  
Sev nodded, tearing her gaze from Frodo. She had to admit she’d gotten a little bit lost just looking at him. “Things have been all right with us, Gandalf. Leastwise, from what I understand.” She looked at Frodo a little questioningly, but she knew nothing had happened with just the two of them in any dangerous way. Frodo eyed her curiously, wondering what the two of them were talking about, but she eyed the Ring and spoke before he could ask. “But I fear things have not been all right with you.”  
Gandalf’s head bowed, and Sev’s eyebrow shot up, adrenaline racing through her. Something wanted Frodo; she could feel it. “You’ve heard of the One Ring?”  
She nodded. Willation had drilled the old saying into her before leaving; he told her all the dangers of Middle Earth on their way through the tunnels. “One Ring to rule them all.” Frodo’s heart sank; she and Gandalf had both known something was wrong, and both knew this Ring. “One Ring to find them. One Ring to bring them all and in the—,”  
Even while reciting Sev could feel the air darkening, could see Frodo’s expression sink. All three present turned to Bilbo’s Ring on the table.   
“No,” Sev whispered. Her resolve crumpled. She wanted to break the thing, wanted to watch it melt, wanted to send it with a seething letter back to Willation and have him destroy it atom by atom. He had told her the dangers of the Ring . . . and they now belonged to Frodo. Her Frodo. “No!” She hissed and slipped back. Frodo watched her, concerned, as a red light illuminated behind her pupils and her eyebrows grew close together. Her fingers tightened about the wall, strained and tense.  
Sev wouldn’t sit down to listen to the rest of Gandalf’s explanation. She paced, although quiet about it. Her eyes flickered from the Ring to Frodo to Gandalf and back to Frodo, as though the Ring had already taken him. She watched Gandalf as he spoke, eyed the Ring with dark, livid contempt. But when she turned to Frodo she grew protective, almost motherly in a guardian sort of way. Her growing anxiety pressed on Frodo.  
Gandalf told Frodo Sauron had but to find this Ring and he would be impossible to defeat; all of Middle Earth would fall to darkness.  
Almost immediately Frodo had a solution worked out in his head. Bury it, like it had been for thousands of years. “All right, then,” he said, grabbing the Ring while Sev flinched, “we hide it! We’ll put it away.” He walked briskly into the living room, but as Gandalf followed him Sev knew it could not be done. She hung her head. They would find it. They would find Frodo. Her grip on the wall’s edge tightened. They couldn’t have him. “We never speak of it again! No one knows it’s here, do they?”  
Neither Sev nor Gandalf had jumped onto Frodo’s logic, so he turned, realizing something must have happened. “Do they, Gandalf?”  
Sev slipped into the room, and Frodo beckoned her to his side. Gandalf inhaled slowly. “There was one other who knew about the Ring. I searched everywhere for the creature Gollum, but the enemy found him first. I don’t know how or for how long they tortured him, but amidst the babbles and screams they discerned two words.”  
“Shire,” Frodo whispered, simultaneous with Sev’s growl. “Baggins!”  
Frodo held the Ring out to Gandalf, and Sev felt her heart settle a little. “Take it, Gandalf!”  
“I cannot!” Gandalf insisted, backing away. Sev frowned.  
“Gandalf, you must take it!” he insisted.  
“Gandalf!” Sev reasoned. She stepped closer to Frodo as she spoke, and the warmth breached his side . . . combated the Ring somehow. “For Zincarna’s sake, Frodo is a hobbit! The Ring is not meant to—!”  
“Do not tempt me, either of you!” Gandalf thundered. Sev initially grabbed Frodo’s arm, although for his protection or hers she didn’t know. Frodo laid his free hand over hers. “I would bear this Ring with the intention of doing good . . . but through me, it would perform an evil too great to imagine.”  
“But it cannot stay in the Shire!” Frodo insisted. Sev’s eyes closed, for they now had but one option.  
Gandalf gravely admitted it couldn’t.  
Frodo backed away, closing his fingers around the Ring. Sev’s hand tightened ever so slightly on Frodo. She could feel the Ring already nipping at Frodo, trying to rip him apart. She wouldn’t let it happen.  
Her heart froze when his words came out: “What must I do?”


	9. Get Out of the Shire

Gandalf sent him into a flurry of packing. “You must leave the Shire immediately.”  
Sev gathered Frodo’s things as well; she didn’t need food and no roll to sleep within. “Where?” Frodo asked. “Where do I go?”  
“The Prancing Pony, in Bree,” Gandalf said, turning to Sev. “Don’t forget it.”  
“Bree, Prancing Pony,” she repeated to herself, throwing a staff to Frodo. He caught it and continued. “Where will you be?” she said, almost demanded, for she did not want anything to happen to Frodo, and wanted to know where Gandalf would be if she needed him.  
“I am off to see the head of my order,” Gandalf said. “He is both wise and powerful. He will know what to do with the Ring.” Then he turned back to Frodo. “And stay off the road,” he warned. Sev made a note of the same as Frodo said, “We can go across country easily enough.”  
Gandalf slipped Frodo’s cloak over his shoulders and his pack over that. Sev winced; she couldn’t imagine being so compacted. Her vest remained unbuttoned, her white shirt loose. Even at night dresses were too confining. She took no pack.  
“You’ll have to leave the name Baggins behind you,” Gandalf said. “It isn’t safe outside the Shire.” Then he turned to Sev. “Take the same last name, Seville. Another one would do you no good.”  
Sev turned light gray and her eyes slipped shut. Frodo watched her curiously. “Yes, sir,” she muttered. Frodo wondered at the sudden sheepish expression beneath her closed eyes, but turned back to Gandalf.  
“Frodo . . . my brave hobbit,” Gandalf said. Frodo smiled at him brilliantly, and Sev couldn’t help but grin at the sight. Frodo had such a smile. “You can learn all there is to know about hobbits in a few months, and after a hundred years they can still surprise you.”  
This hobbit especially, Sev thought. Only the most queer and quirky of hobbits would ever have considered her a friend . . . and she would only consider a friend of a kind, gentle, strong hobbit.  
An air of respect settled on the room, but quickly departed at a rustle outside the window.  
“Get down,” Gandalf hissed, and Frodo abruptly dropped to the floor. Sev fingered a dagger at her side, crouching near enough to Frodo but within good throwing distance of the window. Gandalf slipped his staff out the window, then cracked it down.  
“Ow!”  
Sev lowered her knife even as Gandalf’s hand shot out of the window and threw Sam onto the table nearby, scattering papers and books everywhere. Sam trembled as Gandalf berated him.  
“Confound it all, Samwise Gamgee, have you been eavesdropping?!” he roared.  
Sam only shook harder. “I-I ain’t been droppin’ no eaves, sir, honest!” Sev brought Frodo to his feet. “I was just gardening the grass under the window there, if you follow me!”  
“A little late to be trimming the verge, don’t you think?” Gandalf said somewhat sarcastically.  
“I heard raised voices,” Sam protested.  
Gandalf’s eyes narrowed while he surveyed Sam. “What have you heard? Speak!!”  
Sam shivered. “N-nothing much, just something about a Ring and a Dark Lord and something about the end of the world. Don’t be angry, Mr. Gandalf! And don’t turn me into anything . . . unnatural.”  
“No,” Gandalf said, glancing up at Frodo. Frodo swelled with mild anticipation; at least Sam would be coming too. Sev felt comforted as well, knowing this would make her fear less: one more pair of eyes to watch Frodo. Gandalf bent over the hobbit. “I’ve thought of a better use for you,” he said.  
~0~  
“Hurry, Samwise Gamgee! You must keep up.”  
They set out early the next morning, and Sev had the phrase stuck in her head from the first moment. As she gripped the horse’s saddle she glanced down at Frodo. He kept pace reasonably well, and she wondered if Gandalf had set her astride the mare because he thought she couldn’t walk quickly.  
Gandalf had offered Sev the horse, but to most she didn’t seem to notice. She simply thought Gandalf meant to be courteous, but didn’t want to refuse. She just stared at the Ring; something of it called to her in a wispy, ominous voice.  
The wizard grunted and beckoned to Frodo. He stepped forward, unsure what Gandalf wanted, and Sev jolted out of her trance.  
“Get on the horse, Sev,” Gandalf said. “I don’t need it for some time.”  
Sev inclined her head, hoping Gandalf didn’t just mean it out of grudging kindness. She didn’t want to be a hindrance in any way. “I thank you, Gandalf, but I’ll need practice with my feet. If anything, Frodo or Sam could use the horse.”  
Sam stepped up quietly. “I think he set aside the horse for the lady, Ms. Sev.”  
Sev nodded, almost wanting to believe Gandalf would let her save her strength. But she couldn’t help protect Frodo from such a vantage point. “I thank you all the same, sir,” she said, turning to start them off. At a nod from Gandalf, Frodo stepped forward—followed quickly by Sam—to put Sev on the horse. The moment Frodo’s hands settled gently on Sev’s waist she easily slipped onto Gandalf’s horse. Gandalf nodded again to Frodo, and they moved on from there.  
Sev curled up against the saddle as she remembered when Frodo reached for her. She turned to look at him after, noticed his face turning bright pink. She shook it off. “No attraction,” she muttered again.  
After the sun began to rise, Gandalf led the hobbits into a wood some distance from any main roads. Sev could see what she had made to be the path to Bree (based on the maps she had studied all night) nearby, and accordingly slipped off the horse. Gandalf glanced up.  
“I suppose here’s as good a place as any.” Gandalf turned to Frodo then, kneeling down before him. “Is it safe?” he muttered.  
Frodo felt his pocket, the vibrating Ring . . . which seemed to tremble whenever Sev neared. That made two of them. Sev flinched when his fingers settled gently on his pocket. The Ring twisted something deep down, something she couldn’t place and had never felt before. She felt the urge to drain it overwhelming her, and she feared the pains that would arise all through their journey to Bree.  
Gandalf gripped Frodo’s shoulder. “Never put it on.” He glanced at Sev, and she affirmed her promise to protect Frodo with a simple, yet powerful, nod. Then he spun, mounted his horse, and bounded away.  
Frodo turned to Sam. Sev tried to approach them both, but suddenly succumbed to spasms and fiery shivers. Claws seemed to harrow over her hands, on her heart. Her lungs heaved, and she leaned on the staff Frodo had loaned her. He turned back to her, shocked at her sudden convulsions as she dropped to one knee. He put a hand on her shoulder, but she didn’t respond. Sam leaned forward to ask as well, but Sev’s head rose, and she stood. She glanced at Frodo’s hand on her shoulder, wondering why it had gotten there.  
“I’m all right,” she assured, and they turned to be gone. Sam tried to ask her a few times what troubled her, but Sev wouldn’t have it. She insisted they need not concern themselves, and eventually asked Sam about Rosie—if he had kissed her cheek in farewell. Sam suddenly quieted and backed away. Frodo turned to Sev, asking Sam’s question about Sev’s well-being teasingly.  
Sev’s eyes narrowed, and a dark blush rose to her face as she considered asking Frodo her own. “Well, who did you kiss on the cheek before you left?”  
The reply “I didn’t have to; you’re right here” appeared in Frodo’s mind, but he cut it off before he could say anything, closing his mouth. Sev felt she had hit a mark, but not the one she expected. Frodo hesitated, wondering if Sev would’ve let him kiss her cheek before leaving. Of all the girls in the Shire he had only ever kissed her, even if only on the forehead.  
Despite her earlier display of pain, Sev nearly skipped about the empty, unpopulated fields of the Shire, staring wide-eyed at the vistas surrounding her. No one but her, Frodo, and Sam out here. She’d never been social, and she couldn’t imagine anything better. White-crested mountains of blue lay off to the distance, and green fields dotted with trees surrounded them.  
As they walked peacefully, Sam asked Sev if she wanted him to carry her cloak, for she left it about her shoulders even with the warm sun. Sev insisted she didn’t want to be less than an asset . . . and Sam took her cloak, assuring her she meant a great deal to them. Frodo smiled at the glimmer in her eyes as she accepted his compliment.  
Soon they came to a cornfield Sev recognized, having followed Frodo and Sam there. Sev walked in front when they took the road single-file; she didn’t want anything to happen to Frodo, and Sam somehow gravitated to the back. She and Frodo both halted when Sam spoke abruptly.  
“This is it,” he said.  
Frodo turned back, and Sev followed suit. “This is what?” Frodo asked, searching Sam for his purposes.  
Sam bit his lip. “If I take one more step, I’ll be the farthest away from home I’ve ever been.”  
Frodo smiled. Sev could only imagine him smiling at her so; he had such a tender light to him she never wanted to have snuffed out. She almost wanted to take the Ring and let him be free of it . . . but internally reminded herself it would be too dangerous. To have the Ring would be to kill him and Sam both under its power.  
Oblivious to Sev’s internal battle, Frodo stepped forward and put his arm around Sam. “Come on, Sam.” He turned to Sev as he and Sam began walking. “Remember what Bilbo used to say: ‘It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. If you don’t keep your feet, there’s no telling where you might be swept off to.’”  
Sev didn’t hear Bilbo in him, just him talking to her as though warning her for something she’d already done: leaving Sheratan, daring to take the step off of Atansdorre. Yet, she would rather be with Frodo than at home. Frodo had become home. The notion disturbed her, but even as she looked back at him Frodo felt himself feeling more comfortable around her than he ever had with Bilbo.  
Soon Sam insisted they stop for a decent meal. Sev sighed and settled against a nearby tree, and Frodo knew what she thought: she didn’t like taking meal breaks, spending time when they could be getting to Bree and getting the Ring out of his pocket, as far away from all of them as possible. As a matter of fact, Sev said she would continue to Bree and they could catch up, but Frodo didn’t want anyone walking alone, so he asked if she would stay. Besides, he would have gone with her (perhaps) over Sam, but didn’t want the latter to get lost either.  
Sev built a fire and Sam began cooking sausage and bacon. Frodo climbed up in the fork of a tree to read. It was the book he’d read the day of his birthday; Sev read it three times since then, but still slipped up into the tree after him to watch over his shoulder. She didn’t think he knew she had climbed up, but Frodo could feel her warmth behind him, and it distracted him almost into not reading anything.  
Soon Frodo reached a proposal scene, and his eyes narrowed a little bit. He hadn’t read this part before, probably feeling it irrelevant to the story in general—for he hadn’t read it in a decade or so. He got to one line: “My lady, thou art my closest companion, and I thine; why wouldst thou hesitate?”  
He set the book aside and began smoking as thoughts raced through his head. He picked himself apart until he decided Sev was, indeed, his closest companion, but somehow he couldn’t see himself proposing to her. But he cocked his head after a moment. What if he did? How would Sev react?  
Sev could see the thought work into his face. He wouldn’t pick up the book again, but he had ended when she read the catalyst of the climax. She bored her eyes into his soul . . . as though staring at him would work. It only worked to make her feel relatively powerful and a little vengeful, catharsis for ending the book.  
“Devilish,” she muttered, sliding from the tree.  
When Frodo looked up, shaken from his thoughts, she assumed he hadn’t known she was there. He turned to look at her, shivering a little from the departure of warmth. She wore a jocose glare.  
“What, the book or the smoking?” he asked with a grin. She didn’t approve of smoking, said it equivocated to sticking one’s head in a burning building and inhaling the smoky air.  
She pointed at him accusatorily. “You. For smoking and not reading.”  
Frodo set the pipe aside, and Sev had to keep from breathing a sigh of relief. “You would like to finish the story?” he asked, nonchalant. Sev gawked at him; still jocose, he knew, although something deep down spurred the reaction. He laughed regardless.  
“Of course!” Sev sputtered. As though that were a question . . . “The blasted villain just crashed through the window and stole Mallia! How on Earth do you stop there?!”  
Frodo hesitated, and Sev sidled closer to the tree, staring up at him. He didn’t know if he ought to say anything, but he found himself realizing he might ask her. They certainly were the closest of companions, at least in his life. He thought back on everything he did with her. Sev watched him expectantly when he began to speak.  
“You know when you told me you would stop reading because a novel reflected, however askewedly, something in your own life?”  
Sev lifted an eyebrow, nodding slowly. A crash through the window? Perhaps he felt his life crashed through and his resolve taken by the Ring, but this seemed surprisingly soon to her. Willation said usually the affected carried the Ring for months. Regardless she nodded to his question.  
Frodo noted her ponderous furrow. Hopefully she had deduced nothing huge. Frodo sighed and settled back into the tree. “This one is fairly deep, and takes much contemplation.”  
Curiosity piqued, Sev shuffled closer to Frodo and laid her hands across the tree, her face inches from his own. She had to shove aside the notion that she enjoyed being this close to him, instead attempting to be humorous. The warmth sizzled against Frodo, and he found his thoughts wandering . . . and his gaze found her lips. He wondered what it would be like to kiss her, just for a moment or so. If a kiss to the forehead—after months of doing it—still made the warmth ever so much more powerful, he couldn’t imagine something more and how deeply the simplest kiss would affect him. He blinked it back; she might throw him off, and even if she didn’t he shouldn’t do it anyway. Nothing called for it.  
“Must be exciting!” Sev’s voice broke him out of his trance, but she couldn’t have noticed. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “What is it?”  
For being his best friend Frodo nearly told her. She would expect him to, he knew, but he couldn’t say anything, much less the next words on his tongue, “Sev, I would like to kiss you. I think it would say more than I could.” He bit this back . . . and instead said, “You would find it less exciting and more a laughing matter.” He could imagine saying what he thought, and either she would chuckle nervously and back away or find him absolutely silly. Both were huge possibilities, and he wanted neither. If she could halt the jocoseness long enough to love him . . .  
Sev blew a raspberry, determined not to laugh at anything Frodo had to say. His pondering disturbed her. She hoped nothing had gone wrong in his head already. “Troneterra, no!” She lifted her right hand. “I swear at all costs not to laugh, sputter, cough, or giggle at Frodo’s current novel dilemma.” She lowered her hand and her voice. “Come now, man, what is it?”  
He couldn’t have known she would be ecstatic to hear his thoughts, particularly concerning loving her. He laughed and shook his head, not sure what to say, but determined he would tell her something—whether it be what she expected to hear or not, whether it be what he had on his mind or not.   
Then Sev perked up, and Frodo listened too. She could hear solemn voices . . . beautiful, Elvish voices on the gentle air. They reached Frodo; he sat up abruptly. “Sam,” he whispered. Sam glanced up.  
“Wood elves,” Sev said, and Frodo nearly said it with her, just a second or so behind.  
Frodo leaped down from the tree, and he took off with Sam. Sev followed close until they could see a caravan of graceful, white Elves. All were headed west, and Frodo listened to their song, taking in the mournful words. As Sev slipped into place beside him she could feel their sorrow for the world, how they’d given up on life itself. She felt emotions begin to snap within her: pining for their light, wishing she could give up like they could. Despite the pain in her life she’d never been able to. Her eyes flickered to Frodo; now she had no choice but to live, unless Frodo somehow rejected her. Then she could end herself, end her pain.  
“They’re going to the harbor beyond the White Towers,” Frodo translated reverently. “The Grey Havens.”  
Sam’s voice sounded slightly more epiphanic. “They’re leaving Middle Earth . . .”  
Sev’s words cracked, tinged with fear and sorrow. “Never to return.” Frodo turned to her, wondering at the sudden change in her mood, at the pricking tears against her eyes. She couldn’t imagine what those Elves could be thinking. They were creatures of such light, such power, such life, such fortune, admired by so many, and they would just throw themselves away. It felt like Frodo trying to leave, as though he would. But he had so much light; why throw himself away? These creatures had eternal potential for good, and were only setting the example to their inferiors to give up on life if evil became too strong. Right now that meant everyone should go to the Grey Havens and let the orcs run Middle Earth. Evil had always been a part of Sev’s life; if Sev could survive this, hopefully anyone could. She contemplated giving up, following the Elves. She really did.  
Frodo glanced down at the log, where Sev’s fingers tensed about a patch of broken bark. He laid his own fingers over the back of her hand, slipping her skin into the grip of his own. She glanced down at his thumb, tracing against her knuckles (gradients of warmth spread up Frodo’s arm at the contact), but said nothing as a sudden desire to protect him flooded her. She couldn’t give up until she knew he’d gotten safely home. Gratitude flickered through the despair in her eyes, and she rested her head on the log, savoring his hand with her cheek. It melted his heart to watch her expression grow naïve, as though she needed him in order to live. Which she did.  
“I don’t know why,” Sam said, “it makes me sad.”  
Frodo didn’t either. As they walked away to find smooth campground, though, Sev knew why. The Elves were making a tragedy of themselves, wasting perfect beauty and glory by locking the ones out who really needed it. Perhaps they felt they could not help anyone, but Sev didn’t know how they could think it, how they could wish to leave this poor world alone when they could change everything.  
Once they set up a fire and some food, Sev slipped away, saying she wanted to retire early. In truth she only wanted to contemplate the Elves more. Could they heal her blackness? If she could heal creatures of light from their darkness could her own darkness ever be taken away?  
She turned over, watching Frodo. He talked with Sam, and she followed his eyes as they shimmered in the firelight, heard his laugh echo through the night air, glanced at his gentle fingers that had framed hers. She closed her eyes and held her hand to her heart, as though his thumb were still tracing her knuckles. She could imagine a lifetime that way, and knew she would never leave him, never wanted to. His light and his gentility she would never find anywhere else.  
Unless the Ring destroyed him.  
Her grip tightened over the collar of her shirt, nails almost digging into herself. She wouldn’t let it. Her brows furrowed, and she restlessly rolled over again. Her eyes slammed shut as she imagined Frodo, a dark and savage glare lighting his eyes as he hunched over the Ring. She forced the image away. It only angered and frightened her. The sound of Frodo’s voice behind her finally allowed it to dissipate; he was still safe.  
Finally Frodo and Sam settled down to sleep, allowing the fire to continue for fear the night would get too cold. Frodo almost mentioned Sev’s unnatural, fire-like warmth, but considered the better of it. She would not want to sit up by his side as he rested all night just to warm him while he slept, and Frodo’s curiosity regarding what his lips against hers might feel like would keep him awake until he did it once. Then, perhaps, his curiosity would leave him alone.  
Soon, luckily enough, Frodo could feel unconsciousness settling over him, drifting across him like one gentle feather of sleep at a time. Then Sam spoke, blowing the feathers all over the ground. Frodo felt too much exhaustion to retrieve them. Frodo had heard tossing, but accepted it as a consistent irregularity and could easily fall asleep to it.  
“Anywhere I lie, there’s a great, dirty root sticking into my back,” Sam groaned. Sev turned over to watch.  
Frodo inhaled slowly to speak. The soft earth beckoned his desire to sleep. “Just shut your eyes,” Frodo mumbled, “and imagine you’re back in your own bed . . . with a soft mattress . . . and a lovely feather pillow.” Sev immersed herself in Frodo’s description, wondering what a mattress and pillow felt like. She never assumed she would know.  
Frodo and Sev both settled into silence again, but soon Sam spoke up, blowing the feathers in all directions again. “It’s not working, Mr. Frodo,” Sam muttered. “I’ll never get any sleep out here.”  
Sev watched, amused, as a sweet, tired smile stretched over Frodo’s face, draining the last of his energy for the day. “Me neither, Sam.” Sev stifled a chuckle and whispered a good night to them both as Sam stuffed another sausage in his mouth.  
Surprised, Frodo glanced up at Sev. He thought she’d fallen asleep a long time before. He smiled at her; his eyes caught her off guard, and she just smiled back initially. He hoped their friendship could become something more. Sev finally rolled over, not able to watch him for fear the Ring would take his light away. She wouldn’t have it.


	10. Race to Bree

The next morning they approached the edge of the Shire, down by the Brandywine River and Buckleberry Ferry. Once they reached Farmer Maggot’s cornfield, Frodo decided Sev might not be tired enough to carry conversation. So he initiated one with a question about a book they’d read recently, and Sev went right along with it rather well. They laughed rather openly, until Sev heard Sam behind her and quieted. Frodo followed suit.  
“Mr. Frodo? Ms. Sev? Mr. Frodo? Frodo!”  
Frodo turned back and around the corner.  
“It’s all right, Sam,” Sev said, giving him a look: Frodo’s safe.  
Sam exhaled hard. “I thought I’d lost you.”  
Frodo lifted an eyebrow, and Sev felt worry creeping up on her. “What are you talking about?”  
“It’s just something Gandalf said,” Sam admitted.  
Frodo cocked his head a little, unsure of anything Gandalf would have to say. “What did he say?” Sev felt almost chagrined at being, perhaps, overbearing in wishing to protect him. He did have Sam, after all, and they were more than halfway to Bree. She made a mental note to back off, and did so physically. Frodo shot her a look, unsure at either of his friends. But the warmth left with her, and so he wished she wouldn’t stay away.  
Sam stepped forward slowly. “He said, ‘Don’t you lose him, Samwise Gamgee.’ And I don’t mean to.”  
Frodo chuckled a little. “Sam, we’re still in the Shire! What could possibly happen?”  
The moment his words were out, something barreled powerfully into his side, throwing him to the ground. Sev leaned forward to drag him to his feet, but something else slammed into her.  
“Frodo!” Pippin sat up over Frodo, surveying the hobbit as though no harm had been done. And Frodo realized Pippin undoubtedly didn’t care. “Merry, it’s Frodo Baggins!”  
“Hello, Frodo,” Merry said cheerfully. Sev wriggled beneath the latter hobbit, having starkly felt her personal-space bubble pop. She shoved her feet beneath him, lifting him off of her. She abruptly stood while Sam yanked Pippin off of Frodo. Sev extended a hand and Frodo took it; she brought him to his feet.  
Her warmth traveled up Frodo’s arm, and without thinking about it too hard he didn’t let her hand go. Sev didn’t let go either, but the moment both became conscious of the moment she stiffened. Her fingers slipped out of Frodo’s as his grip slackened, knowing he couldn’t possibly keep it.  
So he turned back to Pippin and Merry, eyeing the vegetables they were piling into Sam’s arms. Sev didn’t take any, backing away slowly. “What is the meaning of this?” he asked dangerously.  
Merry piled Sam’s arms with carrots. “Hold these, will you?”  
“You’ve been into—,”  
“—Farmer Maggot’s crop!” Sev, to start the statement, sounded accusatory while Sam sounded epiphanic.  
Before either Pippin or Merry could respond (or Sev could clunk each in the face with one of their own cabbages), barks and shouts rose from the cornfield behind them. Pippin took off, and Sev grabbed Frodo’s hand as she dashed inside. Merry followed, as did Sam after hastily throwing his bundle aside.  
“I don’t know what he’s upset about!” Merry protested. Frodo nearly tripped over his own feet at the pace Sev pulled him through the corn; fear did not drive her, however, just adrenaline at having taken Frodo’s hand so initially that she wanted to get out of there before he noticed. “It’s only a few carrots!”  
“And some cabbages.” Sev hissed when Pippin nearly halted to turn and speak to Merry while he dashed forward. “And the bag of potatoes we left last week; and those mushrooms the week before!”  
Sev resisted rolling her eyes. Hobbits.  
“Yes, Pippin! My point is, he’s clearly overreacting!”  
Sev abruptly pulled to a halt as Pippin stopped at the edge of a steep drop. Merry slammed into Pippin, followed by Frodo, and Sam catalyzed their fall. Sev released Frodo’s hand and rolled away from the hobbits to tumble down the hill alone. The rest collapsed in heaps, landing on top of each other as Sev rolled off to the side. However she tried, she still slipped into the same path as the hobbits as they neared the end, and she fell the rest of the way with them. Her head unrolled right next to Frodo’s shoulder, and he only felt the warmth for a moment before she scrambled to her feet.  
Pippin started from underneath the pile. “Oh. That was close.” Merry rolled off his back. “I think I’ve broken something.” He produced a thick carrot, and Sev snickered as she backed away. Frodo stood and backed away from his companions.  
“Trust a Brandybuck and a Took,” Sam muttered, brushing himself off.  
Merry did so as well. “What? That was just a detour . . . a shortcut!”  
“Shortcut to what?” Sam said doubtfully.  
Pippin gasped loudly. “Mushrooms!” he cried.   
Immediately the three hobbits were scrambled to their feet, Pippin and Merry using Sam as physical leverage to get up. They raced to the mushrooms, piling them in sacks.  
Sev glanced up at Frodo. He heard a noise . . . as though the earth were moaning in pain, dying even as it warned. Sev didn’t hear the sound, but she could feel something approaching. As her gaze turned to the road, a darkness begged to drain her of her toxins and soak them in for itself, add to its blackness. The pains attacked her—those sharp, burning convulsions—and she collapsed to one knee, gasping to hold back tears.  
She recovered quickly enough to hear him say, “I think we should get off the road.” Frodo stared at the hobbits beside him, but they didn’t seem to care for his warning. He turned back to the main road as Sev struggled to her feet. He turned to help her up . . . but then the earth moaned again, louder.  
Frodo’s gaze shot back to the trees beyond even as he moved to kneel by Sev. Sev glanced up as well while she shoved the pains away. Space itself bent, as though it were trying to run away but had nowhere to go. The odd illusion in the distance spread eerie fingers of wind that stirred the leaves at Frodo’s feet.  
“Get off the road!” he insisted. “Quick!” He and Sev leaped under the nearest tree root, and the other hobbits followed somewhat carelessly. As they all piled beneath the earth, three of the hobbits began bickering a little over the mushrooms they’d found.  
Everything of their movements halted when the heavy hooves and labored breathing of a powerful battlehorse filled the forest air. Sev had to push back a growl at the darkness of this being now so close by. She turned back to inspect the horse and saw a black stallion with savage eyes; black liquid of an unidentifiable origin dripped down its legs and over its hooves.  
Frodo glanced up when two armor-shod feet swung down from the horse and claimed the ground. The earth seemed to shiver within Frodo, and as the warrior’s armored fingers crunched down on a tree root above him he could feel those tremors within the Ring as well.  
Something begged him to put it on.  
The blackness overtook Sev again, and she slumped into Frodo’s side trying to fight the pain back. When her eyes flickered open, Frodo already had the Ring in his hand and slowly began moving it towards his beckoning pointer finger. Terrified, Sev grabbed his wrist. Warmth carved through the influence of the darkness, and Frodo quickly concealed the Ring.  
The rider above them let out an epiphanic hiss, but when Merry threw his bag as far as it would go the intruder shrieked, chasing the sound with its horse. The hobbits scrambled out of the tree root, racing along in scattered order among the trees until they had run far enough away to avoid being heard by the black rider.  
Merry, Pippin and Sam all collapsed to the ground, breathing heavily. Sev stood off to the side, feeling lost: getting to Bree wouldn’t be as easy as it had been, although the short distance between them and their destination gladdened her.  
“What was that?” Merry demanded.  
Frodo glanced down at the Ring in his palm . . . he knew now more of its dangers, and only felt so much more inclined to get rid of it.   
Before he could respond to Merry, the black rider’s shriek rang out through the woods again. “Move!” Sev hissed. “Come on!” The hobbits began running again, dodging trees as they tried to avoid the black rider.  
Night approached quickly, and Merry halted the group for a moment. Frodo stumbled against a nearby tree; Sev didn’t mean to stand next to him, but happened to seek rest from the same tree. Frodo nestled a little bit in the warmth beside him until Merry stepped up to him.  
“Frodo? That thing . . . I think it’s looking for something.” He sounded accusatory, and a growl built up in Sev’s throat as she settled a hand on Frodo’s shoulder. “Or someone.” Sev’s eyes darkened, but Frodo did not fear Merry.  
He turned to the other hobbit, only exhausted and wishing to get home. “Sam and I must get to Bree,” he said. He found no more room for explanation, not yet.  
Merry’s brow furrowed, and Sev relaxed. “Buckleberry Ferry,” Merry whispered. “Come.”  
No sooner did they spring back into the woods than did they have to duck as a black rider crested the hill above them. The rider’s horse snorted, carefully prowling the scent of the air for Frodo, for the Ring.  
Merry turned them aside, only to run right in to the rider. The horse noised angrily, rearing up as its rider searched the hobbits from its vantage point. Sev hissed at the horse, drawing her sword as the other hobbits turned away. She managed to nick its leg before she would have gotten trampled. She turned and raced after her companions.  
Frodo had somehow managed to wind up at the back of the group in dodging the black rider’s horse, and Sev rolled her eyes. If anything, the others should have taken the initiative in protecting him, but she realized they were probably concerned enough for themselves. She could take it. She’d be useless if he had three others invested so heavily in his survival.  
Sev had just cleared the fence all four hobbits managed to cross, but Pippin had already unhitched the ferry from its dock. The wooden raft began to float away as they shouted frightened encouragement to Frodo. Frodo turned to see the black rider tearing across the dock towards him and Sev.  
Sev grabbed Frodo’s shoulders and threw him forward even as she jumped. Both rolled against the planks of the raft, and when Sev sat up she watched the rider’s horse abruptly halt before the river. It reared back angrily. The rider turned it away, and Sev’s eyes widened in horror at the sight of their enemy joining three others identical to it.  
“How far to the nearest crossing?” Sev insisted, turning back to Merry.  
He began rowing, pushing them to Bree, to the end of this excursion. “Brandywine Bridge, 20 miles.”  
20 miles. They would be all right, Sev decided.  
Frodo settled against the ferry. The Ring pulled on his pocket, and now this new weight of the black riders piled on it as though physically there. Sev could see his exhaustion, but couldn’t have felt better for him still being alive and safe. Willation had warned her against the Ring: “For you and for most others, Sev, the One Ring is the most dangerous force of Middle Earth. Beware it, should you chance upon it.”  
She had. And she could feel its pull. Instead she knelt next to Frodo. He shivered against the chill of night, trying to calm his heart and lungs from the race against riders he did not know, but feared regardless.  
Sev laid a hand on his shoulder, calming both of them and warming him. He laid his head against her hand, felt the heat from her clamber into his head and numb him to the dangers of the outside world. Sev could feel the beat of his heart surging through his thick, curly hair. Frodo still lived; on account of the Ring, Sev couldn’t ask for more. Somehow he had managed to survive its influence and dangers thus far, more than she ever could have predicted.  
He fell asleep there.


	11. A Ranger for a Guide

Sev left him periodically to row—in fact to take his shifts rowing—but he didn’t notice. Whenever she returned to him she lifted him from the cold wood of the raft and into her arms, resting his head on her shoulder. He had since they began quieted, but the pulse of life within him kept Sev beyond worry’s reach, so she pressed to feel it.  
Once he woke up she backed away, as he still lay too entangled in sleep to notice she’d been holding him so closely. As soon as she slept Frodo managed to row for some time, allowing Merry and Pippin off to the side. Sam might have resisted if he’d gotten any sleep for the night, but had not so far, and so drifted away. Frodo took his moments completely alone to fear the Ring, and only hope they made it to Bree as quickly as possible. He stood near Sev, taking her warmth into his feet. He knelt down next to her resting form once the current seemed to carry them well enough, and his fingers brushed the hair out of her face. Warmth scattered up his arm like excited fireflies; he backed away before he wanted to do so.  
Only when it began to rain did the other hobbits awaken, although Sev remained stock-still as the others hastily drew hoods over their heads. Merry quickly grabbed the oar from Frodo as Sev sat up. She turned to Pippin and asked under her breath if Frodo had done any rowing.  
Pippin’s only response: “No harm has been done.”  
She didn’t quite understand, but she didn’t ask and stood up to take the oar from Merry. They were near Bree; she could feel it, or at least she hoped she could. Merry docked against the side of the river, and Sam tied the raft down on the shore.  
The rain, having begun earlier, suddenly began to pour hard. The hobbits pulled their hoods hard over themselves, and Frodo tried to subtly stick close to Sev; her warmth easily kept him dry. It perplexed him when the other hobbits seemed to keep their distance from her, and Frodo wondered if they were still intimidated by her.  
When the five of them reached Bree’s wooden city wall, Frodo stepped up to the main door to knock, but Sev covered it first. While she had no intention of speaking to any strangers, she did wish to help in whatever way she could. Then she stepped back and fingered the hilt of her dagger, waiting. A sheet of wood far above the hobbits’ heads creaked open, revealing an elderly man with a lantern. He peered into the darkness.  
“Who goes there?” he asked in a strong accent.  
“We are hobbits of the Shire,” Frodo said loudly, and the man finally looked down. He slipped the wooden sheet closed and ducked down to open one on Frodo’s level. “We seek refuge at the inn of the Prancing Pony.”  
“Queer to have five hobbits out of the Shire at a time like this,” the stranger mused. “What’s your business in Bree?”  
“Our business is our own,” Frodo insisted.  
“All right, all right, didn’t mean to offend ye, little master,” the man said. “Just strange folk been goin’ about.” He closed the smaller peek-door and opened the gate.  
As she watched for the Prancing Pony, Sev dryly considered how a stranger could possibly be suspicious of “strange folk” if he knew anything about the people in Bree. Towering men shoved into Frodo, and shorter ones fingered Sev’s hair and shoulders with dark chuckles. She hissed at them. Most would back away, but some pinched her cheek as they continued walking. She almost bit one for fear less would not keep her safe.  
Frodo turned to at least make sure nothing had harmed her, but then she grabbed his shoulder and gestured ahead.  
“The Prancing Pony,” she muttered, and Frodo followed her gaze to a somewhat sinister-looking sign bearing a rearing horse and the name of the inn, all painted in fading gold. The hobbits dashed through the street, and Sev held the door open for them to enter.  
Warmth—only in the most limited sense—reached them once they stepped inside. The men within (loud and abrasive) only frightened Sev more, and she stayed close to Frodo as the other hobbits lowered their hoods. Sev refused to, keeping hunched over. She still received odd glances, but refused to internalize them.  
Frodo stepped up to the main counter, and Sev hastily followed. “Excuse me,” Frodo called out over the clamor of the inn. An elderly fellow, Mr. Butterbur by way of what Sev recalled about Bree, bent over the desk, peering around until he spotted Frodo far below the level of where he’d been searching.  
Mr. Butterbur greeted the hobbits and proceeded to outline the “nice accommodations for little folk, Mr. . . .?”  
Frodo paused. “Underhill. My name is Underhill.”  
Mr. Butterbur nodded, although he looked a little skeptical.  
Frodo continued. “We’re friends of Gandalf the Grey; can you tell him we’ve arrived?”  
Mr. Butterbur halted. “Gandalf?” He mused to himself for a frightening moment before epiphany crossed his face. “Oh, yes! He’s an older fellow . . . long, grey beard, pointy hat.” Frodo smiled and nodded hopefully, but halted when Mr. Butterbur concluded: “I haven’t seen him around here for six months.”  
Frodo thanked him slowly and sank away from the counter. The hobbits began to huddle, and Pippin pulled Sev into the group of hobbits although she attempted to back out. She ended up sandwiched between Pippin’s arm and Frodo’s. She felt a blush running madly to her face, and didn’t say anything. Frodo dried off quickly with her warmth nearby, and pulled her slightly away from Pippin. She glared at them both, although neither noticed enough or cared enough to let go.  
“What do we do now?” Merry asked under his breath.  
The hobbits decided to order ale. Sev declined, wishing to keep her head. Besides, she’d tried ale once and understood perfectly why Rosie never took any for herself. Had the mood been lighter Pippin might have teased Sev about it.  
The five were seated by Butterbur at a huge table and quickly offered mugs of ale bigger than Sev’s head. She stared at them suspiciously as they were dispensed among the hobbits; she didn’t trust anything about this place, particularly since men kept staring at her. She hissed, and some backed away.  
Noting the benches weren’t too long, Sev turned to go look for Gandalf . . . but Frodo didn’t want her to leave too, so he gently grabbed her hand. She turned back to him. Noting the moment of loss in his eyes, she remained with him. She couldn’t do much, didn’t dare do much; sharing a bench with Frodo and Sam, she shoved up against the former to avoid falling off the edge. Frodo didn’t mind it, as a matter of fact felt her closeness combating the Ring, combating the growing apprehension at Gandalf’s absence.  
Even when the mugs came out, Sev watched Merry slip away back to the bar. Sev glanced after him and the eyes following the Halfling, then turned to shift her gaze to Frodo. Being so close she could see little until she noticed the darkness clouding his face. He fingered his mug and his thoughts muddled within him: worry for Gandalf, a growing purr of the Ring in his pocket, uncertainty about the future, fear lurking at every corner with enemies and ruffians on the rise.  
Gandalf had to come.   
Frodo didn’t realize his thoughts decided to vocalize themselves. “He’ll be here, Sev. He has to come.”  
Merry came back, but Frodo didn’t notice. Sev glanced up at the hobbit, who eyed his enormous, foaming mug hungrily. When he sat down with a moan of ecstasy, Pippin spun to face him. “What is that?” He gawked.  
Merry only flicked his gaze away from his precious mug for a moment. “This, my friend, is a pint!” He immediately turned and proceeded to bury his nose in his prize.  
“It comes in pints?” Pippin’s mouth opened wider as Merry made a distracted noise of pleasurable affirmation. Pippin set his sights on the bar. “I’m getting one.”  
Sev’s eyes slipped closed as Sam tried to stop the relentless hobbit; getting drunk wouldn’t help any of them, but at least Frodo hadn’t even touched his. He stared distantly at the table. “He has to come, Sev.”  
Sev felt her sympathy growing, and her desire to protect the hobbit that mattered more to her than anything. She didn’t want to watch him fall. Her fingers slipped over his shoulder, probing his back. Frodo’s eyes flickered with the gentle warmth prodding the stress out of him. It lulled him to a gentle numbness; the cold fought with her warmth too hard to let it be anything better or more.  
Sev’s hackles raised when Sam tapped Frodo’s shoulder, and he jolted. Her hand braced carefully against his shoulder, almost no longer present. Sam pointed past Sev. “That fellow’s been nothing but staring at you since we arrived.”  
Sev only could process, Sam, you’re not helping his stress before Frodo turned to her. Their noses almost touched before she looked away, into the corner where Sam had pointed. As Frodo tore his gaze from Sev, near as she sat, to look up as well. Both pairs of eyes caught a hooded stranger, cold and haunting in the corner. He sat somewhat casually, and Sev immediately distrusted the look of him: how his legs crossed, the pipe in his mouth, the shadow of his eyes, the thin beard on his face.  
Frodo leaned over Sev to catch Mr. Butterbur. Sev bent forward, but that only resulted in Frodo laying his arm across her shoulders once he caught the bartender’s attention. The warmth calmed him, and she rested there, hoping he’d be all right.  
“Excuse me,” he said. Butterbur leaned over Sev, and she grew apprehensive. Her growl rippled against Frodo’s arm. “Who is that man in the corner?”  
Butterbur’s expression darkened, and he inhaled slowly. “He’s one of them Rangers. I don’t know his proper name, but folks around here call him Strider.” He turned away cryptically.  
“Strider,” Frodo whispered. Sev’s eyes flickered up as Frodo backed off of her, and she saw the pipe’s embers illuminate Strider’s cloaked eyes.  
Except for Sev’s hand at his shoulder, Frodo couldn’t feel anything anymore. The world melted away, and his eyes slipped closed. The Ring seemed to crawl out of his pocket and into his fingers. He turned the smooth, gold metal around in his fingers, a cold, harsh voice entered his mind.  
Baggins. Baggins. Baggins . . .  
Sev saw the Ring and reached forward frantically to alert him, but then something halted them both.  
“Baggins!”  
Frodo’s eyes shot open. He turned around, and Sev glared as her gaze turned back to Pippin. The latter sat at the bar, gesturing to Frodo with his mug. “Sure, I know a Baggins! Frodo Baggins! He’s over there.”  
Frodo glanced down in disbelief, and Sev’s hackles raised. She turned to stop Pippin as he explained his relation to Frodo, but Frodo was faster, more desperate. He leaped up from the bench and dodged through the crowds to get to Pippin and grabbed his arm. Pippin shoved back, and Frodo collapsed to the hard floor. The Ring flew out of his fingers; Sev stared in horror as it flipped through the air. Frodo reached up to grab it . . . and it slipped around his finger.  
Sev stiffened when he vanished, and she leaped up to find him.  
Everything surrounding Frodo grew faded and blurry. The shapes of men and the entire inn blackened and grew almost liquid in form. Then a loud crackling coming from his side caused him to look up . . . and a fiery light filled his vision. A huge, draconic eye, composed almost entirely of fire, blazed through the inn. Its voice crackled and rumbled through the air.  
“I see you,” it growled.  
Frodo scrambled away from the coming fire, then tore the Ring from his finger. The world faded back to a dim, relatively quieter reality.  
Strider approached the floor where Frodo had disappeared, but Sev got there first, drawing her dagger. Strider turned to shove her aside as both spotted Frodo the moment the Ring came off.  
Sev lunged against Strider’s hand. “Don’t hurt him.” She intended for it to sound threatening, but it honestly came out far more of a plea. Frodo heard her and perked into a sitting position, scanning the room for her.  
“If anything, he will hurt himself,” Strider hissed, stepping forward. Frodo stood to back away, but his head solidly smacked against the table he’d hidden under. As he rubbed his head, Strider grabbed his upper arm in a vice grip and yanked him to his feet. Sev leaped for him, but Strider locked a hand around her shirt collar. She reasoned not to fight unless she knew he meant to harm Frodo.  
“I wouldn’t draw more attention to yourself, Mr. Underhill,” Strider snapped, turning with both halflings. He shoved them both up the stairs; Sev followed Frodo until the ranger backed them in to the room he’d evidently taken for himself. He ushered them aside, and Sev protectively stepped in front of Frodo.  
“I can avoid being seen when I wish,” Strider said, turning away. He licked his fingers and began pinching out candles. Then, as he spoke he turned, letting his hood fall from his face. “But disappearing entirely! That is a rare gift.”  
Frodo swallowed, and Sev’s fingers tensed around her dagger.  
“That is no trinket you carry,” Strider warned.  
“I carry nothing,” Frodo insisted. Sev flinched at the lie—as she always did—but remained silent.  
“Oh, believe me, I know,” Strider said.  
Frodo’s eyebrow cocked. “Who are you?”  
Strider didn’t respond, glancing at Frodo. “Are you frightened?”  
Fearing the conversation’s direction, Sev grabbed Frodo’s hand while they spoke. She felt his pulse race under her fingers as he replied: “Yes.”  
“Not nearly frightened enough,” Strider persisted. “I know what hunts you.”  
Sev leaned forward to ask more, for Willation had mentioned nothing about black riders. Immediately, however, the door flew open behind Frodo, and Sev slipped away from his side, drawing her blade while Strider did the same.  
The three other hobbits stood outside, Merry with a chair, Pippin with a torch, and Sam with nothing but his fists.  
“Don’t touch them, or I’ll have you, longshanks!” Sam exclaimed.  
Sev relaxed, backing away, and Strider sheathed his weapon. “You have a stout heart, master hobbit, but that will not save you.” He gestured to the wall, where there were four beds lined up. Although Sam graciously offered to give up his own rest, Sev declined and backed away from the hobbits while they tried to sleep.


	12. Into the Wild

Fear numbed Frodo as he lay down. The Ring would not be safe in Bree, not until Gandalf came. But they didn’t have much time. No doubt the black riders were close behind. Frodo didn’t know where to go, how to get where the Ring could be protected. He could feel its power growing, the tension rising.  
Sev watched from a distance as terror gripped him. He seemed to strain breathing. She stepped out of her shadows, from the corner behind where Strider sat at the window to watch the outside world. She sat down on the bed beside Frodo, and he could feel the mattress sink just a little at the added pressure. She laid a gentle hand to his shoulder, beneath his cloak, and probed his back with her warm fingers.  
Soon he rolled over. The moonlight from the nearby window shed a beam across her eyes, illuminating the white against her initial darkness. He couldn’t but stare for a moment: they were intense, but protective, hopeful, soft in a way. Familiar. Eyes of a friend he recognized. His best friend that didn’t want anything bad to happen to him.  
“I’m afraid, Sev,” he said finally.  
It took her aback to see Frodo so worried, so dark. She leaned over and wrapped her arms around him. He leaned up, and she pulled him into a tighter embrace; her fingers gripped the fabric of his shirt, holding him close, while he embraced her back. The warmth dizzied Frodo, and he nearly slacked against her.  
One of her hands rubbed his shoulders. “You’ll be okay.” Then her voice dropped to a whisper, and she lifted her lips to his ear as she spoke. The movement caused Frodo to tense. “I so swear, you will make it home alive and safe. If anything harms you, I will break it.” She meant it. She couldn’t imagine letting anything alone if it tried to hurt him. Frodo wanted to believe her, held by her arms and words. She wanted to protect him.  
But she couldn’t do everything, as hard as she tried. Having the one she loved in her arms for a moment gave her motivation as she felt his heart pulsing throughout his core, near her where nothing could touch him. Her eyes pricked when she spoke; she never imagined he would let her promise anything.  
Finally Frodo settled back. “Thank you,” he said. She laid him down and told him to rest, letting her finger trace his forehead before she backed away. He tried to sleep, he really did. Worry filled his mind, numbing his senses and blocking sleep.  
Even as Sev turned to the window to watch outside, Strider beckoned her to stand before him. “You care for him?”  
Sev nodded assertively. “More than he will ever know.” Strider cocked his head, so she continued. “I could die for him, Strider, and would feel the better for it. But he doesn’t know, will never know.” Not at this rate of his attentions, anyway.  
Strider bowed his head. “I am sorry. But I’m glad he has an able guardian.” He laid a hand on Sev’s shoulder. “Keep him safe.”  
The ranger didn’t need to say it, and both of them knew it. But something about the man’s words stirred memories of Gandalf and Bilbo saying the same thing deep within Sev, and she almost thought she could hear Willation saying the same. Keep him safe. Keep him safe.  
“Yes, sir,” Sev said.  
Strider leaned back in his chair. Both he and Sev turned to the window, glancing across the way to where the hobbits’ original room lay.  
“Do you have someone as well, Strider?” Sev asked, not turning her gaze.  
Strider grew remorseful. When Sev finally looked up, she almost thought he no longer did, if he ever had. Then he said, “She is giving up her immortal life for me.” He shook his head slowly. “War is upon us. She would be safer with her people.”  
Sev’s eyebrows lifted. “An Elf?” she whispered.  
The ranger nodded to Frodo. “You cannot blame me,” he said with a slight grin. “Your preference seems to lie in the Elvish as well.”  
Sev turned to look at Frodo. She could tell he didn’t hear them; his eyes were too wide and frightened. He had shown no recognition at any movement or sound in the room. Her gaze locked on his face, and she could feel her core begin to ache at the sight of him. Sheathed in moonlight, his gentle, pale face seemed to glow. He had slender features, she knew, but every time she realized just what he looked like, it stopped her heart. She knew this Frodo . . . better than she knew anyone else. Every time it struck her, her conviction blazed like a fire throughout her. Here her fingers gripped her dagger hilt so hard she could feel the imprint begin to carve into her skin.  
They couldn’t have him.  
But she couldn’t help him now either. Fear was the one poison she could not drain, and the only one paining him now. She could at least try.  
Sev jolted when shrieks sounded behind her, and she spun to face the window. The hobbits’ room flickered with dark light, and soon four or five black riders emerged. The other hobbits shot up to sitting positions, save Frodo, who still seemed lost in the depths of fear. He heard the term Nazgul as Strider explained . . . and Sev turned away from the explanation as well.  
Nazgul, Ringwraiths, triggered an actual memory in Sev’s mind. Willation hadn’t mentioned what they were, just that dark servants of Lord Sauron—pursuing the Ring—might be a hindrance if she ever ran into the Ring. She hadn’t expected to, and Willation had said he hoped she didn’t. He warned her of details regardless, but she wondered how she hadn’t thought of these as Nazgul.  
Now she just missed Willation and everything she could have had back home . . . then realized Frodo and his reciprocation of friendship meant more to her than anything, much less Atansdorre and her “parents.”  
She snapped out of her reminiscing when Strider gravely announced they should get onto the road. The hobbits quickly packed up, and Strider ushered them down the stairs of the Prancing Pony. He turned back to Sev, eyed Frodo.  
“Tarry a little,” he said. “We shall be finding a horse to accompany us. I will return when we are ready to depart.” Then he left.  
Sev sat on the bed and watched. Frodo could only feel the Ring burning against his chest as he feared becoming like the Ringwraiths, a servant to Sauron and his darkness for their greed and malice.  
The anti-creature beside him bitterly asserted that the Nazgul should have been called Seville . . . blood of malice. She could share a name with the very creatures trying to destroy everything she cared about. At the thought of losing him, Sev’s hand strayed to his arm, and she gently held his shoulder.  
At the slight pressure coupled with soft warmth, Frodo snapped out of his fear, turning over. “Sev.”  
She nodded carefully.  
“They are gone?”  
She nodded again, stood hesitantly, and slung his pack over her shoulder. She gestured for him to come, and he followed her. He’d been too tired to notice what she picked up, or that he had none of his possessions with him but the Ring. He realized somewhere along the way, however, and while Sev made arrangements with Strider he slipped it off of her shoulders.  
The group acquired a pony, Bill, set aside for Sam to lead. Strider quickly led them from the dark city of Bree out into the forest nearby, lidded with gray clouds.  
“Where are you taking us?” Frodo asked finally.  
“Into the wild,” was Strider’s only reply.  
Sev glanced up at Frodo. She felt Strider trustworthy, but then knew he loved someone and didn’t expect him to be an enemy after all he’d done on their behalf. Frodo’s qualms were settled regardless, and he continued with conviction as he realized Strider would likely be helpful, in fact necessary.  
But the rest of the group did not seem resolved.  
Merry stepped close to Frodo, between him and Sev, and the latter slipped back. “How do we know this Strider is a friend of Gandalf’s? He could be working against us.”  
“I think a servant of the enemy would appear fairer . . . and feel fouler,” Frodo replied. Then he turned his sights ahead and walked faster. “And we have no choice but to trust him.”  
Sam spoke up from behind. “Well, where’s he leading us?”  
Sev knew and opened her mouth to speak, but Strider got to it first. “To Rivendell, Master Gamgee. To the House of Elrond.”  
Still slipping behind, Sev matched up with Sam. “Do you hear that, Sev?” Sam asked excitedly. “We’re going to see the Elves!”  
Sev nodded, also excited, but more worried about Frodo as he walked ahead of her. He glanced back, watching her smile at Sam.  
Sev’s gaze turned to the Ring, and she could feel the pains attacking . . . her hackles raised at the dark power before her. Then the pains attacked, stabbed into her. She stepped back, staggering, and collapsed to one knee.  
“Are you all right, Ms. Sev?”  
She looked up at Sam, straining to see him through her blurring eyes. She nodded, trying to breathe. “Go ahead.” She almost jumped at how typical her voice sounded, how the pain she felt refused to fall into her voice. She just sounded a little tired. “I have a pebble stuck between my toes; it just hurts a little bit.”  
Sam nodded hesitantly and continued forward with Bill. As Sev convulsed, Frodo turned back to find her. He glanced at Sam as the majority of the group continued forward.  
“Sam?”  
Sam turned, slowing the horse. “She says she has a pebble between her toes, Mr. Frodo.” He shrugged. “Even if she needs help, I don’t know that she wants it.” Sam clicked, and Bill continued walking. Frodo stood still, watching as Sev’s lungs began to heave uncontrollably. He stepped up to her cautiously, not sure how to react. Even after 13 years he’d never really seen her this way.  
“Sev?” She didn’t respond. He stepped up even closer and actually knelt down right next to her. He fingered her hair, not sure if being more open would help or hurt the situation, or what the situation even was. He glanced at her hand tightening around her stick: her veins surged, as though her heart were malfunctioning. Taken aback he stood, unsure what else he could do but wait for her to awaken.  
When Sev’s eyes opened and the convulsions faded slowly and painstakingly away, she finally stood. It surprised her to see Frodo standing in front of her.  
“Sev, are you all right?” he asked, wondering if she would actually tell him.  
Sev shrugged, but she shivered as she did so. He settled by her side, and her eyes followed him, uncertain at his motives as well as fearing his nearness. She blinked, and Frodo brought her to her feet, offering his arm for her. She looked a little tired.  
Sev accepted, but tried to take it as an opportunity to help him instead. It didn’t entirely work, although as she stumbled along—the pains had decided to stick around for a while—by Frodo’s side there were moments she felt like she could hold him up. It only confused him, but he didn’t ask.  
When they caught up to the rest of the group, Sam had set up his pans over a small fire and began cooking food. Merry, Pippin, and Strider were gathered around the fire, and Sev split off from Frodo at a welcoming gesture from Pippin. She didn’t want to leave him, but felt chagrined enough at her need for support the whole way without being able to give anything back.  
Frodo watched a little helplessly, sitting down to eat himself. He finished reading the novel he’d brought with him while Sev flirted with Pippin. Something flickered within him that he didn’t understand . . . he’d felt it before, when she laughed with Rosie at the Green Dragon.  
Jealousy. Not enough to make him despise Pippin, but he’d never felt it before. He jolted a little bit, turning back to his book with an internal refusal to take this new aspect of his character. Sev didn’t notice anything; she simply felt as though she was being gracious to Pippin’s attentions, as both knew they were feigned. She wouldn’t have taken it as flirting unless she watched it herself.  
Strider ordered them to pack everything away again, and soon they set out onto the road. Sev remained at the back, watching for signs of any Nazgul. After only an hour of walking over somewhat snowy terrain, Merry announced he felt second breakfast coming on. Sam brought Bill to a halt, and the four hobbits began unpacking the horse.  
Sev shook her head and trotted off after Strider. They didn’t have time, but she didn’t feel she had the authority or desire to tell them to keep moving. Strider turned to her; she usually remained at the back of the group, so having her in front surprised him.  
“Where is Frodo?” Sev felt a jolt at Strider’s concern for Frodo, and she glanced behind her at Bill.  
“Gentlemen!” Strider called out. They all turned to him. “We do not stop until nightfall.”  
Pippin stared up at him, although all four hobbits froze. “But what about breakfast?” Pippin asked.  
Strider blinked. “We’ve already had it.” Sev’s eyes slipped closed. Finally someone understands, she thought.  
“We’ve had one, yes,” Pippin said, smug tone growing in his voice, “but what about second breakfast?” He assumed an according expression. Sev turned, a little hopeful, to Strider. The latter just shook his head and kept walking. Sev felt a minor spike of triumph, but somehow managed to contain her cackle.  
Frodo ambivalently began packing again; he didn’t feel hungry anyway, probably wouldn’t be until nightfall. Walking would leave no time or energy for hunger . . . and the Ring didn’t leave any desire for it either.  
Sev listened as she kept walking. “I don’t think he knows about second breakfast, Pip,” Merry said, resigned to his fate.  
Pippin wouldn’t back down. “But what about elevenses? Luncheon? Afternoon tea?” His voice escalated desperately. “Dinner? Supper! He must know about them, doesn’t he?”  
Merry turned to him. “I wouldn’t count on it.”  
Strider shook his head beside Sev, palmed an apple, and threw it over his shoulder. He then threw a second, and Sev heard it smack something. “Pippin!” Merry called out. Strider handed her an apple as well, and she accepted it, although she only had intention to give it to Frodo.  
They walked through various terrain, woods and fields of mossy rock. Finally, in the middle of the afternoon, Frodo approached Sev. He’d felt the weight of the Ring all morning, but by her side it fizzled away from him, trying to reach her.  
“I finished the book, Sev.”  
One of Sev’s eyebrows raised as she turned to him, extending the apple. “Without me?”  
Frodo grinned slightly and accepted her offer. Sev bit her lower lip as she contemplated her lips meeting that smile, if they ever would (which at this point she doubted). She thought about it a little too hard, and felt herself physically leaning a little towards him.  
“I got over the contemplative spot,” he continued.  
“When did you have time to finish it?” Although she didn’t feel like conversing, Sev didn’t want him to go. She liked seeing him capable, not tainted by the Ring just yet. He had accepted food, and eaten earlier that morning. That, and she just enjoyed being around him in general.  
Frodo glanced back at Pippin, remembering the way he’d spoken to Sev earlier, embraced her, kissed her hand. Sev hadn’t really seemed to notice . . . in fact wouldn’t have taken that as flirting had she been asked. “During breakfast. You were flirting with Pippin.” He tried to make it sound lighthearted, but something pressed on him, something he didn’t want to admit.  
She frowned to herself. Flirting? She did not flirt. “Devil,” she muttered. That didn’t encourage Frodo until she shot him a jocose stare and didn’t let go. He nudged her, his face burning, and caught up to Bill. Sev faltered as he left; the pains swelled as he departed, and she fell back.  
Soon they entered a marsh. Frodo knew the water would likely be cold, and so backed up to be near Sev. She didn’t anticipate either of them could get through without a struggle, and she subsequently grabbed his arm. They spread out from each other to maintain balance, which permitted Frodo to reach with the hand of the arm she had to grab her own arm. As they trudged through the marsh, most of the hobbits were wet from head to toe, but Frodo managed to keep his arm dry with Sev’s warmth channeling through it. She called out to the other hobbits that she had a spare arm, but none of them took it. Frodo wondered if they could actually feel her warmth, if they’d have accepted had they felt it.  
Sev began to weaken as they reached the border of the marsh. Her brain picked up very slowly on thousands of bites from marsh bugs all over the four hobbits, and something deep inside begged her to drain them. Holding on to Frodo forced her to take the bites from him when they came, but her intent level of refusal caused dizziness in her head. She stumbled the last few feet to somewhat dry ground, the pain spreading like a fire. Frodo lowered her to the ground, concerned, and sat down next to her, hesitantly laying a hand between her shoulders. She said nothing about it, just looked dizzy and exhausted. The other hobbits passed them by, and her desire to drain them slowly ebbed. When she internalized the feeling of Frodo’s hand to her shoulders, she began to stiffen. She didn’t want to get up; she wanted to savor his touch as his fingers very cautiously pressed down, moving across her shoulders very slowly.  
After a few more moments, Sev felt far too perky (and a little too much of a blush coming to her face) to stay there any longer. She stood abruptly, hoping Frodo hadn’t noticed her involved in what had happened just then. She held out her hand.  
“I’ll take your cloak. It’ll dry faster hanging up.” Frodo slipped the cloak over his head, and Sev hung it over a nearby tree branch. Frodo wondered if having it on and her by his side would have been faster, but she didn’t know the warmth existed; it would have done little from her perspective.  
Regardless of what happened to his cloak, he wanted to be with her at least until he dried off. Then she could leave him if she really wished to. He gestured for her to sit by him, but she took no notice. She glanced at his feet, damp and almost a little muddy.  
Sev gestured to his feet. “May I?”  
He shrugged, not entirely sure what she wanted. She sat down and removed a small cloth from her pocket. Strider had begun to boil a bit of water, and she dipped the cloth in that after ensuring he wouldn’t mind. She wrung it out, then gently rubbed the muck off of Frodo’s feet. His eyes slipped closed and he laid back until she finished; the day in the marsh apparently had left his feet desiring something. He sat up to thank her, but she laid the cloth aside, oblivious, and began pressing the balls of his feet with her thumbs. The warmth shot up through his legs and spread through his nervous system. His brain tingled, and he laid back, content to stay there.  
When Sev saw his reaction, she almost wondered why he would exaggerate something like that. Sure, it might feel good (she didn’t try to think about asking him to do hers), but it couldn’t feel that good. She decided to turn her shock into laughter, and he followed, although he felt more wistful and a little confused at her reaction. She backed away, and the warmth left with her. He thought about asking her to come back, but said nothing. If she wanted him to he would rub her feet, if it would make her stay.  
Before Frodo could ask, Strider reentered camp with a deer slung over his shoulder. The hobbits looked up a little hopefully, and Sev reluctantly joined them. She helped Strider clean it, and then they ate. Frodo sat close to Sev, his arm up against hers. He still hadn’t dried off yet.  
No one spoke during dinner. The day had been too taxing, the task upon Frodo too great for anyone capable of speaking to handle. To follow the sinking mood Sev began humming mournful songs under her breath, and stepped away from the group as they rolled to sleep. Frodo followed, as the warmth of the fire came with smoke and ashes. She didn’t really mind, in fact preferred having him nearby; when she saw him standing behind her, she patted the ground beside her, and he sat down.  
When Sev finally admonished him to sleep, the hobbits curled up uncomfortably in their cloaks. Sev positioned them, after Frodo fell silent, in a circle around him to keep him safe. He wondered if she thought all this truly necessary; if she stayed close by, nothing would happen to him.  
As the other three hobbits drifted off to sleep, Strider eyed Sev. She tossed restlessly, watching Frodo sharply. “Would you like me to sing?’ Strider asked quietly.  
Sev nodded, hoping it would calm her nerves.  
She began to drift off to the sound of his voice, but Frodo—who had been falling a little bit—abruptly awakened, listening. Sev picked up a romantic theme for the way Strider’s voice accented his words with tender sincerity; Frodo translated the lyrics to himself. When he sat up, Sev’s eyes slipped closed.  
“Who is she?” Frodo’s low voice pierced the air.  
Strider turned to him; neither he nor Sev had expected him to care. Hearing those words, that concern, come out of Frodo, Sev almost hoped it could work for her. But she couldn’t by any means count on it.  
“This woman you sing of,” Frodo clarified when Strider didn’t respond.  
Strider glanced at the ground, turned away from Frodo. “Tis the Lay of Luthien, an elf maiden who gave her love to Beren, a mortal.”  
“What happened to her?”  
Strider stumbled over his words, and Sev felt a pang of intense sympathy. “She died.”  
Sev froze, imagining Frodo dead across her lap. She inhaled sharply, began to shudder at the thought. The image refused to leave her. Her eyes strained wide open, as though they could not see enough if they weren’t on Frodo at all times.  
Frodo glanced at Sev. She looked tense; he wondered what more she would give up for him.  
Strider broke the silence, following Frodo’s gaze. “Get some sleep, Frodo.”  
Frodo settled back down, and Sev waited a few minutes before turning to the ranger. “I’m sorry, Strider,” she said. He cocked his head, confused. “I’m sure it worries you, to love an Elf.” She bit her lip, hoping she hadn’t gone too far.  
Strider nodded solemnly, and his gaze flickered to Frodo. “You should rest too,” he said.  
Sev laid down and turned, intently watching Frodo. She allowed her eyes to close periodically, but she didn’t want to sleep. Her fear began to take over as Frodo’s breathing leveled. He’d heard nothing of their conversation as sleep began working through his mind, and he continued not to notice her now. He cringed, subsequent of fears emptying themselves in preparation for a night’s rest as sleep stretched its liquid, uncertain fingers for him.  
Sev turned to Strider. “May I go to him?”  
Strider nodded.  
The liquidity of Frodo’s rest slowed to a halt as Sev crept over the damp earth and knelt by his side. Her warmth spread across his back and shoulder, extended to his face as she drew closer. She studied him, memorizing his gentle features before the Ring could harm them. She wanted to carry this burden herself, protect the priceless light and let him stay the way he’d always been. She lowered herself, carefully brushed her lips against his cold, fragile cheek. Frodo stiffened a little, but the soft kiss warmed every fiber of his being, and so he relaxed. His eyes slacked back inside his head until she pulled away. She lowered her mouth to his ear.  
“I’ll never let them hurt you.”


	13. Shattered Light

When they awoke Frodo remembered hearing her voice, then falling asleep immediately. She didn’t bring it up, and she didn’t seem different; he almost wondered if he’d dreamed up the whole thing. Then he traced his cheek with his fingertip. He could still feel her lips there, warm and soft. It surprised him how a feature so dark could be so gentle and pleasant.  
To Sev’s perplexed disappointment, they only walked half the day before coming to a small hill topped with a crown of castle ruins. It was an old watchtower, apparently. Strider pointed to the stone remains and turned back to face the hobbits behind him.  
“We’ll rest here for the night,” he said quietly.  
All were silent as they approached the hill. Sam tied Bill in a small closure out of the way at the base of the small mountain before they ascended. Once they reached a ledge tucked into the rock, Strider sat them down.  
“I’m going to go scout around.”  
Sev frowned and hissed, “Strider, we’re not safe alone.”  
Strider pulled her aside, and she sat down. “I picked up four swords for the other hobbits; you should be fine. I need to ensure the Nazgul won’t sneak up on us, and we need food.” He gave her an intense stare, so she nodded reluctantly.  
Strider stepped away and distributed shortswords to the four hobbits. “These are for you,” he said grimly. Frodo unsheathed his a portion of the way; the blade spanned thicker than his arm easily, and tapered from an inch thick to a sharp edge. Strider turned to Sev.  
“I don’t have one for a female, unfortunately—,”  
Sev threw it aside. “I have my own, Strider. And I appreciate the gesture, but I’m sure . . .” She trailed off, not feeling snarky enough to finish. I’m sure I could fight better without a sword than any of them could with one.  
Her sarcastic expression brought a small grin out of Strider. He clapped her shoulder. “Keep them safe, will you?”  
Sev nodded, and her peripheral shifted to Frodo as he set his sword aside. He watched her looking at him, but neither acknowledged the other’s awareness. Strider turned and departed the mountain, fading into the shadows of a cloudy midday.  
Sam, Merry, and Pippin stepped away to converse while Frodo sat with his back to the mountain, fingering his sword. He felt the weight of the Ring, of the Nazgul, of everything ahead of him. Taking the Ring to Bree had accomplished nothing, and he didn’t know how to react to this newfound responsibility he had for an undesignated amount of time or distance.  
Sev watched carefully, then sat down close to him. “Frodo?”  
He glanced up, uncertain why she had come. “You want to finish the book?”  
She shook her head. “Not now, my friend.” She sighed and settled against the stone nearby, her thoughts filled with the impending dangers and how badly she wanted to be rid of them.  
Frodo lifted an eyebrow. “Must be a predicament indeed.” His heart thudded as he thought about his own novel predicament, how she sat so close he could probably touch her if he just reached out.  
Sev didn’t reply, feeling a little disturbed. She didn’t watch him; she didn’t have the heart to be so solemn. Her eyes glazed over as she stared into the distance. Frodo followed her gaze, approximately directed towards the other hobbits.  
“Who are you watching?” he asked. Her attention snapped back to him, and he hesitated. “Pippin?”  
She gawked at him, surprised. “As if I would!” He laughed, relieved more than she could have known that she faced no attraction to Pippin. Good enough, Sev considered, happy to hear him laugh again. She leaned forward and ruffled his hair; his entire head tingled with warmth. “You didn’t get enough sleep last night, that’s what it is. Go to bed, Frodo.” Then Sev leaned towards him jocosely, as though about to issue a threat.  
Although Frodo recognized that she was simply joking, he leaned forward as well. She took it as a responsively humorous gesture . . . but her lips were only an inch away. His eyes flickered, and he hoped perhaps she would psychologically turn around, let him kiss her and respond in a way that told him how much she cared, if she did.  
Sev saw no such thing, and had to swallow a chuckle before becoming serious again. Frodo felt his hope slip away. She pulled back. “Do not fear them, Frodo.” He laid down, feeling defeated. “I will watch you. Sleep peacefully, please.” Her immediate drop from jocosity to ultimate concern shocked him, but he responded anyway.  
He laid himself down, a smile rising to his face. “Thank you, Sev.”  
Sev lay down about a foot away from him, waiting.  
Somehow she managed to drift off; Frodo fell asleep somewhat uneasily as well, rolled up in his cloak. He awoke to the smell of smoke and sizzling meat some time later, after the sun had set over the distant mountains. His eyes widened as consciousness—and the realization that someone had built a fire nearby—sank in. He flipped over to see Merry, Sam, and Pippin all circling a fire near him.  
“What are you doing?!” he cried, terror gripping him.  
Merry blinked. “Tomatoes, sausage, and some nice, crispy bacon,” he said proudly. Fools, Frodo thought urgently, springing from the ground. They were going to do nothing.  
“We saved some for you, Mr. Frodo,” Sam said, sounding hopeful.  
Frodo shook his head, stamping out the fire frantically. “Put it out, you fools, put it out!”  
Sev shot up, and dread overcame her as she smelled the remains of the fire. Darn you, Sev; you never sleep, she grumbled to herself. Her inner voice grew more intense and a little abusive when she saw Frodo staring back at her, fear lining every inch of him. He realized she had not been involved in the fire, for how her hair exploded in messy tangles around her face. She’d been asleep, but now she scrambled to her feet and unsheathed her sword.  
A shrill shriek, the shriek of the Nazgul, froze her heart. Frodo raced to the edge of the precipice, and he could see a fleet of shadows stealing through mist at the base of the mountain. Sev hissed to herself and bared her blade. Frodo leaped away from the ledge, shouting to the other hobbits. “Go!” They all unsheathed their swords, racing up the stairs. Sev paused, lingering at the back. She thought it would be wiser to get Frodo off the mountain and send him away . . . but she didn’t bring it up as she ran after Frodo.  
The four hobbits and the anti-creature came to a ring-shaped courtyard of ruins, with statues and crumbling columns surrounding them on all sides. The wind whipped around them, creating a hiss on the air that caused them to turn every which way to watch for Ringwraiths. Sev felt a slight surge of hope as the other hobbits crowded around Frodo, protectively locking him in.  
As he turned to keep an eye out, Frodo felt a sudden chill sweep over him . . . specifically over his breast pocket, where the Ring lay vibrant and alive. Frodo slowly let his eyes drift around to where the Ringwraiths began stepping over the rims and stairs of the ruins. Sev shifted her gaze as well, feeling the pull of the darkness. She struggled with herself, wrestling to stay back, to keep from joining them. She came from the blackness, but now that she knew light she wanted nothing to do with it.  
Sev slowly ushered Frodo to the back of the group as the Nazgul stepped forward, crooked blades raised. Five of them surrounded the hobbits. Sev wondered how many the hobbits could take, perhaps one per two of them.  
But before she could say anything, Sam leaped forward. “Get back, you!” he shouted, but the Ringwraith quickly threw him aside. Pippin and Merry huddled in front of Frodo, and they were also easily swept aside. Sev began to growl, and Frodo’s sword clattered against the ground, slipping out of his shaking fingers as he scrambled away from the Ringwraiths. He could feel the Ring in his pocket and the terror seizing his heart. He and Sev backed into a pile of stone.  
The head of the Nazgul stepped forward, challenging Frodo with his sword.  
“Leave him alone!” Sev snapped. She lunged for the Nazgul. He swiped at her, but she deflected it; the strike sent shocks of pain up her arm. He stepped back, surprised, and she took that as an opportunity to slice his arm. The Nazgul shrieked angrily, throwing her back. She hit the ground, then stood to face him again. Another Nazgul grabbed her hand as she stood, twisted the blade from her grasp, and yanked her to him, his hand embedded in her hair. He held a silver knife to her neck. Sev could feel her fierce protection for Frodo and her need to join the Nazgul fighting each other. She strained not to fall to the darkness surrounding her.  
As the Nazgul approached Frodo, he felt the Ring pulling at him. He slipped it out of his pocket, eyeing it carefully.  
Sev’s gaze shot between Frodo and the Nazgul, both of them incessantly eyeing the Ring. Sev jolted in her captor’s grasp as the Nazgul reached down to take the Ring from Frodo.  
Frodo’s senses began to fade; he could only hear Sev in the back of his mind.  
“Frodo!” she cried out. “Frodo! The Ring, Frodo!”  
The Ring slipped on to his finger. He vanished from Sev’s view as she strained to help, as she watched, now incapable of doing anything. Although Sev could now see less, Frodo could see everything in dark shapes—and the Nazgul, figures of ghostly white. Their skin stretched over unreal faces; their eyes, empty, flickered over him. His gaze caught Sev: she looked perfectly normal, unlike everything else, save her eyes. Black eyes, framed in white veins, watched him in terror. Her pupils were white as well, her irises bright orange.  
Although still changed, she was the only normal thing in his world of vision.  
The head Nazgul reached for the Ring, and it pulled Frodo’s finger up to reach its master again. Frodo resisted, but the blackness began to overtake him, almost causing him to will the Ring back to Sauron. He set his jaw and pulled it away; the Ring’s weight counteracted his efforts, but his willpower apparently could do enough. The Nazgul hissed, and the blade in its hand stabbed into his shoulder. He cried out as pressure and cold flared through his shoulder, spreading through his body in chills; his skin burned and shuddered.  
Sev saw the blade vanish into his body, and horror swept over her. Frodo’s outcry stopped her heart, and she determined furiously never to let it reach her ears again. “Noo!!” She slammed a bite over the Nazgul’s fleshless fingers, and with a screech it released her. She grabbed its blade and slashed back at it until it backed away. Then she discarded the sword, leaping desperately towards Frodo as she left it. He tore the Ring from his finger, crying out. Sev grabbed the hilt of the Morgul blade, yanked it from his shoulder, and threw it.  
While numb cold filled him, Frodo strained against the blackness claiming every inch of his body and soul until Sev grabbed him by the shoulders and dragged him back, away from the Nazgul. Warmth counteracted the numbness, letting him rest while Sev fought his inner battle for him. He felt no more, only haze surrounding him.  
“Sev . . .” His groan didn’t come from his conscious mind, but it triggered Sev into deeper protection. She pulled him into her arms, protecting him from the onslaught of wraiths coming at them.  
Strider leaped into the ruins, wielding a huge, silver sword. He battled the Ringwraiths and managed to set some of them on fire. A few leaped away, and Sev knew they thought they’d won, having stabbed Frodo. No doubt they would return for the Ring once he died. She choked back a dark hiss at the thought; she wouldn’t let him die.  
“Can you help him?” Sev insisted once Strider reached the huddled hobbits. Frodo convulsed, his eyes wide—they flickered rapidly.  
Strider lifted the discarded knife from the ground. “He’s been stabbed by a Morgul blade.” The metal point dissipated into the air, and he threw the empty hilt aside. Sev thrust Frodo into his arms. “This is beyond my skill to heal. He needs Elvish medicine.”  
Sev couldn’t run fast enough, but the rest of the group couldn’t keep up either. She had to keep far ahead of them; Frodo’s halted cries of pain stung her as though she were being stabbed by little knives on all sides. She clamped her hands over her ears, convulsing as she collapsed to her knees in the midst of three monstrous stone trolls in a small clearing; she couldn’t take his pain. She had to do something.  
Strider laid Frodo next to her, and she leaped to him. At Strider’s gesture she ripped aside Frodo’s shirt. The Morgul stab beckoned to her, and an unquenchable thirst to drain it knocked into the side of her head. The moment her finger initially touched the blackened skin, however, she snapped away. It felt too good as the dark poison trickled up through her arm, giving her the strength capacity a hundred times that of normal blood. She would pursue healing the Morgul wound as long as it remained.  
Frodo could partially hear when Sam knelt over him. “Look, Mr. Frodo; it’s Mr. Bilbo’s trolls!”  
Sev buried her forehead in her hands as Frodo faded out of consciousness again. Her fingers—now stained with the blackness of the poison within Frodo—traced his forehead. She glanced up at Strider.  
“He’s gone cold,” she said gravely. They didn’t have much time.  
Pippin held back tears. “Is he going to die?”  
Strider knelt down beside Frodo, opposite Sev. She eyed Strider carefully, not releasing Frodo. “He’s passing into the Shadow world. Soon he will become a wraith like them.” At this Frodo’s eyes rolled to the back of his head, and his breath began to heave harder. Strider turned to Sam, and they both raced off into the forest to find kingsfoil to slow the poison. Sev didn’t follow them for fear Frodo would slip away in her absence.  
His eyes flickered over her, and she swallowed a sob back. She refused to lose him. And if she did lose him—she didn’t want to dwell on that. She refused to let him go.  
A white light filled the vision of both Sev and Frodo. The latter turned over slightly, and his eyes widened. A beautiful Elf woman in a flowing, white gown gracefully descended from her horse, stepping towards them.  
“Frodo,” she said. Sev sat entranced; the grace and light before her seemed such an alien thing. The woman continued in Elvish.  
“I am Arwen; I am here to help you.” At Frodo’s persistent lack of consciousness she spoke more intently. “Hear my voice. Come back to the light!”  
The battle waged harder within Frodo, and he convulsed as darkness overtook his conscious mind. The vision faded from before Sev, and Arwen knelt down next to Frodo, no longer illuminated by bright light. Sev heard the other hobbits whispering excitedly about the new Elf, but Sev couldn’t entirely have cared less. Perhaps this woman could save him, and Sev needed nothing more.  
“Frodo!” Arwen whispered urgently. Strider bit into the kingsfoil and squeezed some of the juice of it into Frodo’s shoulder. The hobbit’s eyes bulged as the weed counteracted the poison within him. Sev bit her lip. Seeing him go through so much pain . . . she didn’t know how much longer she could take it. But if she could help she would.  
“He is fading,” Arwen said under her breath. “We must get him to my father.”  
Strider lifted him on to Arwen’s stallion and told her he would go to Rivendell with Frodo, then send back horses. Arwen presented that she could ride faster, but then Sev stepped up between them, gripping Frodo’s ankle as though her life depended on it. She cleared her throat, and the two glanced down at her.  
“Please, let me go with him.” Not only did Sev want to let Strider be with Arwen (she assumed they loved each other—or at least hoped that they did if Arwen was indeed the Elf Strider loved), but she didn’t want to let Frodo out of her sight. “I know the way to Rivendell and I’m even lighter than Frodo. Just have me go with him.”  
Arwen shook her head after a pause, but Strider grabbed her hand and began speaking quickly in Elvish. Sev could only catch a few words, but got the idea that sending her with Frodo would probably be best.  
Sev leaped up onto the horse before they could finish their debate, although she felt the verdict fairly decided. Frodo’s back warmed, and the poison strained against Sev’s influence; temperature battles crashed through Frodo as she sidled up against his back and looped her arms through his own to keep him up—as well as to reach the reins.  
“Ride swiftly,” Strider said, clapping Sev’s knee. She nodded sternly, and Arwen urged the stallion into the woods. Sev lurched, hanging on hard as the horse leaped away, towards Rivendell.  
“What are you doing?!” Sam’s voice faded quickly behind Sev. “Those wraiths are still out there!”  
She narrowed her eyes as the stallion sped along through the dark woods. They took him from me; I will take them.  
Sev saw no sign of the wraiths all night, and when her heartbeat slowed she could feel Frodo’s surging through him, trying to fight its fate. She gripped him tighter. “Stay with me, you devil, stay with me,” she muttered. Tears pricked at her eyes, hoping talking to him on Weathertop hadn’t been a goodbye.  
The horse continued relentlessly through the dawn and most of the afternoon before a shrill shriek stilled Sev’s heart, and she glanced behind her through the thinned trees. A wraith on its horse tore out of the quiet woods, pounding across the earth towards Frodo. One after another, more wraiths joined the first until there were nine, racing over an open field less than a length behind Arwen’s stallion. Asfaloth, Sev thought, if she recalled Arwen’s instructions to the steed correctly.  
Sev tried to get the horse to turn through the maze of forest as Ringwraiths closed in, but behind Frodo she couldn’t get a decent grip. Asfaloth, thankfully enough, managed to get through quickly, and they stayed a decent distance ahead of the Nazgul. That is, until one of them came right up to the side of Asfaloth and stretched his hand out towards Frodo. Sev strained to move the horse, but could not get control from her vantage point.  
Frodo felt the Ring in his pocket pulling him to the Ringwraith; the darkness opened cold arms to receive him, and he wanted—in some sick and twisted way—to submit, anything to escape the stabbing sting centered at his shoulder.  
Sev cursed at the wraith, then reached around the front of Frodo’s head with one of her hands, guiding him back and away from the Nazgul. She let Asfaloth have his head, and he ripped away through the woods, dodging through trees and narrowly turning corners to avoid the Ringwraiths. Sev nearly fell off with Frodo’s momentum when they leaped over a log. How she managed to stay on she didn’t know. A branch scratched at her face, leaving a black mark on her cheek.  
Asfaloth took one final lunge through the forest, and Sev stiffened with a slight gasp when water splashed against the bottom of one of her feet. She grabbed the reins and yanked hard until Asfaloth halted; Frodo fell back into her, and she strained to sit upright.  
The Nazgul let out a series of shrieks. Their horses shied away from the water, prancing mightily. One of the Nazgul turned his horse long enough to face her. She felt ripples of energy from the Ringwraith, drawing her to the darkness that craved her . . . that the blackness of her core wanted more than anything. She snapped away. This one had stabbed Frodo, and he would not take the hobbit from her.  
The Nazgul hissed. “Hand him over, she-Halfling.”  
Sev straightened herself, peering over Frodo’s shoulder. She drew her sword, keeping the reins in both hands. “If you want him, come and claim him!” she challenged. Then she yanked the horse’s head away from the river, praying for help as she tried to keep a grip on Frodo, the reins, the horse’s barrel, and her sword all at once.  
She heard plashes behind her as Nazgul entered the river, but then an Elvish chant—and subsequent roaring of water—followed. The Ringwraiths shrieked fearfully. Sev dug her heels into Asfaloth’s sides; he leaped away into the forest, and when they crested a small rise Sev turned back to look: the Nazgul were nowhere to be found. The surface of water settled as though nothing had happened.  
Sev felt a small stroke of triumph as Asfaloth raced proudly towards Rivendell. A stab of cold lurched throughout Frodo’s shoulder, throwing Sev’s warmth from him. He groaned, leaning forward, as his soul lingered on the shifty brink of the shadow world. Sev gasped as pains rocked her, begging her to drain his Morgul poison and become a wraith herself. She slacked against Frodo, and the reins fell from her grasp. He slumped out of the saddle. She fell with him, arms locked around his torso, and they rolled for a moment while Asfaloth ground to a halt.  
Sev lurched to her knees. “Frodo! Oh, Frodo . . .” She laid him down on his back, her hands at his shoulders. His eyes were distant with black poison spreading through them, his expression pained and growing cold. Tears sprang to her eyes, but did not fall, as she pulled the hobbit into her arms, buried his head under her jaw. His hood collapsed under her hand, and she brushed her fingers through his soft hair—his skin under it chilled her.  
The warmth enveloped Frodo, and he wanted to dig deeper into it. Something about the cold inside of him, though, refused. Her words sliced through the murk of darkness clouding around him.  
“Please, give him the light that I don’t have. Save him, please, he is everything to me. He is the hope of this world. Save him—,” Sev swallowed, held him closer. “I love him.”  
Frodo felt a fizzle of shock before he slipped back into semi-consciousness; Sev’s warmth fought hard against the coldness building within him, causing him to black out completely. But Sev’s words (and Frodo’s lack of rejection to them) gave her a little comfort, and she lifted him into her grip. Breathing hard, she counted down, then tried to stand while carrying him. They weighed about the same amount, and she strained to carry him. Her feet tried to slip out from beneath her, and she crashed to the ground.  
Her resolve did not break as much as her physical strength. Asfaloth obligingly knelt down beside her, and she slid Frodo into the saddle. The horse stood, and Sev gripped the saddle; her breath heaved in and out.  
She closed her eyes, set her mind, and slipped onto the stallion. She didn’t have to direct him home, much less pick up the reins. He galloped home himself. Sev buried her face in Frodo’s shoulders, where she rested as the horse did what she no longer could.  
Finally Asfaloth slowed. Dizzy, Sev glanced up—Rivendell. Tucked away inside a forested canyon, the dazzling Elvish city filled her with an anxious hope. She leaped off of Asfaloth, but Frodo fell with her. Her ankle cracked against the ground, and she hissed with the pain.  
As her blood attempted to repair her ankle, she dragged Frodo by the shoulders towards the beautiful city. She cried out for help, hopeless against the dead weight of a growing wraith in her arms. Pains and screams of darkness sounded in her head as her fingers pressed over where Frodo’s wound resided; sharp cold entered her, chilling and exciting the darkness she’d been born into. Focusing on Frodo—and on her admittance of her love for him—she shook it away.  
Gandalf raced out from the halls of Rivendell. His face grew grave when he saw Frodo. He reached forward and gathered him away from Sev’s arms. Determined to continue helping, Sev grabbed Frodo’s ankle, but slacked into unconsciousness. Gandalf dragged her along; she stumbled behind him, half-asleep and only comforted by something of Frodo in her hands.


	14. Kiss Out of a Dream

Soon they whisked Frodo away from her, into a white room with a huge bed in the center. Gandalf locked her out, but she found a little hole in the wall where she could squeeze in and watch. Lord Elrond of Rivendell administered medications and implored Frodo to come away from the darkness. Gandalf threw Frodo’s cloak and vest aside, right into Sev’s face. She squawked, and he discovered her hole. He frowned down at her, tensing his hand to grab her by the collar and throw her out.  
“They’re at the trolls!” Sev said suddenly. “They need horses.”  
Gandalf disappeared immediately. Sev set Frodo’s cloak aside, eyeing him on the bed. They’d wrapped him in a huge, white robe that hung about his arms, far too big for him. She cocked her head, hoping he would be all right. Then she settled back into her shadows, waiting anxiously. Whenever he tossed she would lurch from her hiding place and grab his hand away from his shoulder (having heard Elrond say he ought not to touch it).  
Soon the wizard came back in. “His companions are safely at Rivendell.” He eyed her hand locked around Frodo’s, and one of his eyebrows shot straight up. “You haven’t disturbed him?”  
She shook her head. “No, Gandalf. However, I doubt I could do anything to disturb him; he’s sleeping harder than Pippin eats.”  
Gandalf soundlessly crossed the room and sat down in a chair next to the bed. She eyed him carefully; she didn’t trust Frodo with him, not after what he had just barely done. Sev backed away guiltily, considering how poorly she had lived up to her promise not to let him get hurt. She hissed to herself, curling up in the shadows, away from Frodo where she belonged. Away from everyone so she couldn’t hurt them. And she couldn’t heal this; she’d thought she could heal anything tangible. But this pulled at her, until Elrond repaired it to the best of his ability. While they said it would never heal—much to her anguished dismay—it had lost enough of its darkness not to tempt her anymore.  
~0~  
Light and gentleness, sans Sev’s familiar warmth, filtered through Frodo’s head. Memories trickled back to him: the darkness drained from his shoulder, and yet it didn’t come from the comfort of familiar warmth.  
Before he awoke a dream rippled through his head. He could see a white shore; the mists cleared ahead of him. A bright, swift sunrise illuminated the horizon over the spread of ocean to his side. Something of cold, fidgety peace overtook him, but quickly replaced itself with warmth.  
He glanced down at his arm, where the transition from cold to warm centered. His arm now surrounded Sev; she smiled and laughed when she saw him. While this was Sev, some things had changed—her blood looked a little purple, her eyes and dark lips brighter. A few sweet moments passed, ones Frodo never wanted to let go. A liquid tenderness filled Frodo as he cupped her soft cheek in his hands and his lips brushed against hers.  
The sweet gentility of the kiss and Frodo’s sincere desire for such a thing to happen sufficiently awakened him.  
As consciousness approached so did the realization that something soft truly surrounded Frodo. As his senses recovered, he almost felt he’d been laid in a bed, a very gentle one. Perhaps the mattress he’d told Sam about. But he didn’t understand why he should be there. He should be back on the ship, kissing Sev. He wondered if her lips would be so tender against his own, or if she would so readily let him kiss her, and respond in such a way.  
Memories of Weathertop flooded him before he could think on it anymore. He suddenly tossed, and Sev tensed in her corner. So he’d been moving for a long while, but in a short increment of time back there he’d stilled and relaxed. She cocked her head, wondering what could possibly cause him to look so peaceful. She wanted to say she’d never seen such satisfaction in anyone’s expression before, much less a sleeping Frodo’s expression.  
Finally Frodo forced himself to ask his location. His eyes were too heavy to open.  
“Where . . . where am I?” Sev lurched at his words, but kept herself back.  
“You are in the House of Elrond, Rivendell.” Frodo had not been expecting a response from Gandalf. “It is 10:00 in the morning, on October the 24th if you want to know.”  
Finally Frodo’s eyes slipped open, and Sev’s breath caught before she let out a huge sigh of relief. Frodo did not see her, though. He first saw the intricate Elvish architecture surrounding him, then spotted Gandalf to his side. He gasped. “Gandalf!”  
“Yes, Frodo, I am here,” Gandalf chuckled. Sev itched to join them, to feel Frodo and know he safely lay there.  
Frodo grimaced, gripping his shoulder as he sat up. “You suffered quite the injury, my dear hobbit. A few more hours and you would have been beyond our aid.”  
Frodo surveyed the huge, white bed and vast, white sheets he lay amongst. He turned to Gandalf, more questions perplexing his mind. “What happened, Gandalf? Why didn’t you meet us?”  
Sev hadn’t bothered to ask, but she supposed this would be a good a time as any.  
Gandalf’s expression darkened a little. “I’m sorry, Frodo.” He swallowed. “I was delayed.” His eyes glazed over, and he stared a little into the distance.  
Sev’s eyes slipped closed, and she restrained a small outburst. A delay, Gandalf? Frodo is permanently scarred because of a delay?! She certainly didn’t blame Gandalf—she wanted to have handled the wraiths herself—but this would all have been over if Gandalf indeed met them at Bree. She settled fitfully when she decided he must have had a good reason.  
Frodo cocked his head. “Gandalf?”  
Gandalf shook out of it. “I’m sorry.”  
Sev fidgeted, but as Frodo’s gaze swept the room he saw her movement. He peered into the blackness as she shrank back. He could still feel the kiss in his dream, and wanted to see what it would truly feel like, even if he knew he could not—would not—initiate it himself.  
“Sev?”  
Before his next words could come out, Sev bit her lip and sprang from her corner. Her warmth flared against his Morgul stab, the poison of which backed away at her approach. She wrapped her arms around him, and he embraced her back.  
“Frodo, you’re—well, curses, still a hobbit!” she cried.  
Frodo chuckled to himself, bringing her down into his arms. “Yes, Sev.”  
Gandalf sounded a little resigned. “No small thanks to her, either. She brought you here.”  
Frodo turned to thank her, but he could see a gray blush already creeping to her face. He still intended to do so, but then she backed away, and her fingers entwined with his own. He blinked, then squeezed her hand. He noticed the book he’d brought over on a nearby table and he handed it to her.  
She ruffled his hair, feeling a little chagrined. “Devil.” She accepted the book and knelt beside the bed. But Frodo did not release her hand, and she didn’t pull for it back.  
“Frodo!”  
Sev snapped to consciousness when she heard Sam and sharply folded into herself. Frodo glanced up, anticipatory, as Sam darted inside, grabbing Frodo’s hand.  
“Sam!” Frodo exclaimed.  
“Bless you, Mr. Frodo, you’re awake!” Sam cried joyously.  
This time Gandalf chuckled; Sev sighed as she wondered what Gandalf had against her. “And Sam has hardly left your side.” Lies, Sev thought. You’ve kept him away from here this whole time. He never would have left Frodo if you actually let him in.  
“We were worried sick, weren’t we, Ms. Sev?” Sam continued, staring down at her. She couldn’t help but smile at Sam, the sweetheart.  
“Thanks to the skills of Lord Elrond,” Gandalf interjected, “you’re beginning to mend.” The wizard turned his head to Lord Elrond, a tall, graceful Elf with long, dark hair. He smiled kindly at Frodo. His eyes flickered to Sev with a slight darkening, and she cowered away. Any help she could have wanted or hoped for from the Elves would be nothing if they did not trust her, and she didn’t know how to get them to see past her heritage.  
He turned back to Frodo. “Welcome to Rivendell, Frodo Baggins.”  
Frodo smiled back at the graceful Elf; he felt at home here.  
Sev sighed again to herself. So much light and love and happiness around her, even when Frodo suffered a concentrated darkness in his shoulder—the one thing she might’ve been useful for in a place like this she could not do. She couldn’t heal despite everything she’d been designed for, everything she had to suffer through. Her eyes flickered once again to Lord Elrond’s; she didn’t know whether to plead or threaten, although the former might never work again.  
Elrond just inclined his head. He turned with Gandalf, who insisted that Frodo rest. Sam squeezed his master’s hand, and Frodo smiled as he departed. Sev stood to leave as well, although her steps came reluctantly. She glanced at Gandalf hopefully, but he shook his head with a stern glance. She stood and traced her fingers on the white bed as she began to leave.  
Frodo reached out and grabbed her wrist. She froze at the contact and spun to face him. He didn’t want her to leave; his thumb idly rubbed across her skin, and warmth spread through him in ripples.  
“You might as well stay in and read, Sev,” he said.  
Sev lifted an eyebrow, more than happy to stay. “As long as you sleep,” she threatened.  
Frodo sighed and leaned back into the pile of pillows behind him. Sev snickered; Frodo wondered why he still wanted her there, how he could have grown to love her as he did. Then her words pierced him again.  
“Save him—I love him.”  
Sev’s jocose voice snapped him out of it. “Just imagine you’re in an Elvish bed, with a superior mattress and a hundred, lovely feather pillows.” She smirked a little, and Frodo chuckled. Sev’s spine tingled at his laugh, the laugh she didn’t know that she would ever hear again.  
“Good night, Frodo.” She sat next to the bed while he settled to rest. He turned over, refused to face her. He fell asleep quickly.  
Another dream slipped into his head . . . he stood back on the white ship. The sun melted back the remaining mists, and water washed over him like cold falling stars. A warmth tugged on him from the side.  
Sev’s eyes looked, frightened, into his. A pleading light filled her gaze, and sympathy caught his heart. His lips tingled, remembering their kiss, hoping she wished as much as he did for another.  
“Don’t leave me, Frodo.”  
She took him in her arms, laid his head against her heart. Their pulses beat out of time; exhaustion claimed Frodo, but he knew Sev was terrified.  
He wanted to tell her he would never leave her; she had nothing to worry about.  
But he awakened too quickly.  
Sev finished the book in less than an hour—Frodo didn’t need too much rest, so he slept minimally before he could feel her energy waking him up. He feigned a toss in his sleep to watch her, but she didn’t even look up. She ravenously ate the kissing scenes before her, relishing in the idea of such expression and passion on an understated, tender level. She flicked pages of dialogue to find more kisses and embraces, more factors of her life she would never have even if they were so simple a child could understand their importance. Some might have called those scenes were exaggeratedly innocent. But she loved every one of them, and how in such blatant ways they stated that love was all-powerful.  
Indeed, having felt love so little in her life, Sev seconded the idea whole-heartedly.  
Frodo watched her fascination as she pondered those scenes, how she would wistfully rub her arm and lightly bite her lips until they paled from pressure.  
Her mind wandered, as did her gaze, flickering to Frodo. She thought him asleep, but still said nothing out loud to herself. She didn’t go anywhere, knowing he would want to see the rest of Rivendell. And Troneterra, she wanted to go with him. She hadn’t seen it either, but figured watching his excitement would be enough. Hopefully they could stay for at least a week before going back to the Shire.  
The Shire. Sev exhaled slowly, and her head sank back against the wall. Gandalf said Frodo’s wound was permanent. Nothing would be the same; nothing could be. In theory. Maybe Frodo would be strong enough . . . but Willation had laid heavy stress on the dangers of the Morgul blade. Although Frodo had received healing, Sev didn’t know if the consequence of darkness and pain were permanent. Even under the hands of the Elves, Willation said, the shadow could replenish itself. Once impacted it could not turn Frodo into a wraith, but pain would always be there.  
Sev stood to leave, and Frodo stilled as her gaze turned back to him. She faltered in place; he looked so relaxed, his features sweet and gentle. She wondered what he dreamed about as she silently padded over to his bed. She didn’t want to awaken him, but could have gotten away with more than she did if she wished. Even so, she felt like she was pushing it, and it surprised her when she didn’t see an awakening response.  
She laid her forehead very carefully against his own, and her heart thudded inside of her as she did. The warmth numbed Frodo immediately, so he couldn’t entirely tell that they were touching, only for sake of being tangled in mild exhaustion and muddle from her sudden approach. She pulled away and brushed the hair from his face, cleared it so she could softly kiss his cheek.  
Frodo strained not to react, and fought with himself not to turn that last inch and feel her lips against his—to make that illusion a reality as he wanted it. But a small grin escaped him as warmth fluttered through him. Sev felt him move, and she jolted suddenly away, hissing slightly at herself.  
Leave him alone, she snapped.  
“Sev.” He almost told her, but shut his mouth, hoping she hadn’t heard him. She jolted, not expecting him to wake up. She cursed at herself again for waking him up.  
“Yes, Frodo?”  
Frodo’s eyes flickered open when he realized her voice had moved. He blinked when he saw her hand on the doorknob. “Where are you going?”  
Sev smirked. “Where you cannot until you are dressed.” She cackled on her way out. Frodo rolled out of bed as she began to explore Rivendell, peering about the bright halls. She didn’t want to do it without him as much, so she found the roof above Frodo’s room and nestled between the wooden shingles.


	15. Hobbit Elf

In the meantime, Frodo shed the white sheet surrounding him, as well as the bandage about his shoulder. While he unwrapped the latter, his eyes narrowed and one brow arched. A dark scar, a crater of skin in his flesh, throbbed coldly. He fingered it carefully; the blackness inside the crater looked like liquid. An icy tingle stabbed through his shoulder bone, and he snapped back. A dark imprint of black poison remained on his finger.  
Frodo quickly located his old clothes, but left the cloak behind. But as he dressed he found a beautiful little book, mahogany and bound in gold with a leather latch on the front. He picked it up carefully; he had no doubt Rivendell had vast libraries, and perhaps Sev had borrowed this one.  
Or brought it.  
Frodo clicked open the latch just to glance inside. A dedication met him in scrawled ink: Yes, Willation bound it, but it’s from both of us. We’ll miss you, Seville! Love, Sher  
So it had come with Sev. Frodo wondered what could be so important within for her to take it and not food. He flipped to the next page; it must have been a worthy story indeed. It began with a date, and sounded like a journal. The entries were largely repetitive, speaking of despair and darkness in a bittersweet sort of way, as though darkness were a part of the protagonist’s life.  
He quickly learned—skimming the book—that the protagonist was a girl, forged under Alchemical circumstances to prevent a life from being taken. Resultantly, the girl lived a life against reality itself, an anti-creature with no hope for a future or a family, living and breathing agony. As soon as the prologue ended and the true story began, Frodo couldn’t stop shifting through the pages. Something about the author’s tone struck a familiar chord, one he’d grown to love, he realized. He shook it off; it did sound like Sev. Perhaps she had written the book. He did know she could be moody, but this story had no romance, so something didn’t quite match her here.  
Lo and behold, a romantic interest appeared. Frodo didn’t understand, however: the author downplayed the male’s role, stating that he was simply a friend and could not become more. But whenever she described him, over the next 13 years of journal entry, admiration filled her words, admiration that she cast down for its ridiculousness.  
Having skimmed the entire thing, Frodo didn’t entirely know what either of them looked like. But the moment he saw the description of said romantic interest, he paused.  
His hair looks soft. Chocolate, but soft; I refuse to touch it. I’d never stop! I wish you could hear me laugh at my own statement, but I suppose me from the future will understand. I promise, I know I’m being ridiculous. But his face . . . I’ve wanted to kiss him for a long time. I can’t believe—all right, I’m just fantasizing now. He’s my very best friend, you know. We read together. And when we read, he gets stuck in the book. It’s so cool to watch! Hobbits just don’t do that. His eyes grow sharp, and his hands tense. But then I can’t help but think that I’ve touched those hands . . . but he doesn’t care like I do.  
I think I love him.  
And I think I love him because—well, not only because he’s my friend and because he’s the most amazing creature I’ve ever met, but because of his eyes. That sounds really silly . . . let me explain, please. That’s the most precious part of him. His eyes are this . . . gah, I can’t even begin to describe them. Crystal blue, and huge, but that’s not it. They’re . . . bright. He’s so innocent. He loves life, he loves people . . . he knows what love is like, and he uses it everywhere, spreads it to everyone. I’ve even felt him care for me from time to time. He has everything I don’t, is everything I can never be, and possesses everything I admire in this world. He knows so little of pain; he’s lost his parents. The ink began to blot, as though watered slightly. I can’t imagine what that was like. But he has his uncle Bilbo now.  
Frodo lurched. Somehow he’d been expecting this to come up. He glanced up at the date. April 10th; that didn’t help. The year marked 8. He glanced back at the beginning; she’d marked the first date with year -20. An asterisk marked the -20, and he glanced down.  
-20 – Shire-Reckoning, 2985th year of the Third Age. In case I ever get curious, because I will undoubtedly forget what years these were.  
Frodo did a quick calculation and concluded that this April entry had happened five years before the most recent April. Five years. She’d loved him for at least five years . . . if not longer. Frodo thought back to when he met her. They’d been together 13 years. He shook his head. So long. His eyes flickered back to the book. Those many times she’d mentioned loving him. She meant it.  
He flipped the page back to where he’d left off and quickly caught where to pick up from.  
So he’s my family. Bilbo, I mean. Frodo . . . I wish I could call him family. I guess I can, but not in the way I—you know what, never mind that. He’s as close to me as anyone has ever been, although I’m sure he’s had relationships stronger than mine with him. His parents, for example.  
I sigh. There’s nothing I can do except continue to protect him. That’s become my goal in life, you know; I have nothing else to live for. Had I not found him I would have bled myself a long time ago; I deserve nothing more than to die here, but somehow I have Frodo Baggins in my life, and haven’t found the courage to let him go.  
The entry ended there, and Frodo set the book aside, dazed. Sev had dark blood; Sev was no hobbit, but an anti-creature. Sev had no parents, no family, no home . . . because she carried darkness as her life.  
Frodo stepped numbly out of his room, trying to process. But everything made so much more sense, knowing what he did. How she acted, how she lived, her entire present being. He walked to the edge of a balcony, buttoning the vest he realized he hadn’t gotten to. Sev glanced down from her roof, entranced by the hobbit. She cocked her head and stepped to the edge of the shingles; he did look like an Elf, graceful and bright.  
But unlike the Elves he cared about her.  
She stepped down from the roof to join him. He jolted when she approached, feeling the numb warmth against him. Now that he understood he debated asking her, talking to her about what had happened, but when Sam approached from behind them he didn’t dare. She saw something tampering with his mind, though, but let it pass as Sam told Frodo to come with him.  
“I have a surprise for you, Mr. Frodo.” Then he turned to Sev. “I think you’ll be excited too, Ms. Sev.”  
Sam allowed them to walk around, admiring the Elvish tranquility of Rivendell. Frodo told him they would find his surprise on the way, and he conceded. Soon they ran into Pippin and Merry. Frodo spun excitedly, embracing and leaping with the other hobbits. Sev stepped away, but Merry crushed her to him. She laughed and patted his back before moving on to Pippin. In all this excitement everyone hugged everyone, and eventually Sev leaped into Frodo’s arms. It took a wave of warmth for Frodo to realize what had just happened . . . and the difference between embracing an energetic Merry or docile Sam and a fragile Sev. He moved to set her down, but found he didn’t want to let go. She shifted in his grasp, a little uncertain at the length of the embrace, but at least she didn’t feel uncomfortable. So she hugged him back.  
Before Pippin or Merry could start teasing them, Sam grabbed Frodo’s shoulder. Frodo lurched away, and Sev felt her resolve slip out. She drooped a little in place until Sam pointed nearby.  
“There’s your surprise, Mr. Frodo.”  
Frodo smiled wider, and Sev gasped.  
“Bilbo!” Frodo’s voice overlapped Sev’s: “Master Bilbo!” Frodo leaped forward, and Bilbo stood to meet him.  
“Frodo, my lad!” They embraced, and Sev backed away, taken by the tender moment. Bilbo released his nephew after a long moment, then beckoned to Sev. She embraced Bilbo as well. He held her tightly enough that she couldn’t breathe, but she hugged him regardless. Frodo cocked his head, wondering at how Bilbo could hold her as long as he wished. Frodo let back on his heel a little bit.  
Bilbo took Frodo aside to look at the Red Book of Westmarch. He dismissed Pippin, Merry, Sam, and Sev to go eat with the Elves. But Sev did not go, not after Bilbo gestured to her with a wave of his hand. Sev stuffed herself up above them on a stone ledge.  
Frodo sat down on a stone bench Bilbo gestured him to. He opened the huge red book; he’d never gotten to look inside before. He flipped over the huge cover, feeling the crisp pages rub between his fingers. His gaze turned to the gentle calligraphy.  
“‘There and Back Again . . . a Hobbit’s Tale by Bilbo Baggins!’” He beamed up at his uncle. Sev’s spine tingled. She always had wondered what his sharp, entranced gaze sounded like in his voice, and as he read she could hear it. “This is wonderful,” he murmured, flipping through diagrams, drawings, maps, and chapters upon chapters of story.  
“I meant to go back,” Bilbo said. “Visit Laketown, see the Lonely Mountain again.” He strained to sit down beside Frodo. “But age, it seems, has finally caught up with me.”  
Frodo turned back to the book. His breath caught and his Morgul stab stung with cold when he saw the map before him.  
“The Shire,” he breathed. He turned slowly back to Bilbo, and Sev faltered at his sad tone. “I spent all my childhood pretending I was off somewhere else—off with you, on one of your adventures!” A smile tried to rise to his face, but it fell easily as he thought of what this adventure had entailed: learning dark things, thinking and feeling what he didn’t want to feel. Nothing about growth or excitement, only pain. “My own adventure turned out quite different. I’m not like you, Bilbo.”  
Sev bit back a whimper and slammed her eyes shut.  
Bilbo tenderly fingered his nephew’s jaw. “Oh, my dear boy.”  
They talked of many things following that . . . things Frodo wanted Sev to hear, for Bilbo had told him Sev would come with them. She didn’t understand most of the things Frodo said, as they were mostly his thought processes concerning what he had read, how he felt darkness and pain, and how he wanted to help. But Bilbo caught on; he gave him advice, addressed in a way that Sev wouldn’t understand. Frodo didn’t need her to. He just needed to know what to do.  
In a word, Bilbo told him to hang on; Sev would let him know when he could step forward.  
Frodo went back to find Sam, and did little more than mull over Sev’s history as he went.  
Sev snaked out from atop the balcony and paced below, thinking Bilbo had departed as well. But Bilbo gestured to her once she saw him, and she sheepishly joined him on the bench.  
“Frodo would have wanted you to be here. Come sit, my dear Seville.”  
He slipped his arm around her and squeezed. “And how has our little she-hobbit been holding up with all of this?”  
Despite her immediate tension at Bilbo’s touch, Sev saw the sincerity in his eyes and crumbled to it. She shook her head, biting back a sting in her eyes and throat. “It’s hard to watch him go through so much pain.” Her eyes closed again, and her gaze shuffled away. She’d had the responsibility to keep him safe, given by herself, Strider, Bilbo, and Gandalf. And she promised Frodo she wouldn’t let them hurt him. She’d failed. Why he still cared for her remained beyond her anti-creature capacity to understand.  
Bilbo nodded sadly, patting her shoulder. She didn’t look at him. “Adventuring certainly brought more fortune for me,” he said, “but I’m glad it’s over for Frodo. Now you can all go home.”  
She shook her head, finally turning with a slight grin. “I love Rivendell. I would love to stay just a little longer, give Frodo more time to heal.” Then she paused. “Gandalf said the wound is permanent.” She shook her head persistently this time, imagining the consequences. So the Ring wouldn’t destroy Frodo; this would. She thought they were safe, but they could never be, not now. “It can’t be, Bilbo. That would destroy him.”  
Bilbo sighed. “I fear it will.”  
She didn’t want to process the idea; that beautiful light in Frodo’s eyes . . . it would fall away. Then a question popped up in her mind, one she would have asked Bilbo had she not known where he went to. “Not to change the subject . . .”  
Bilbo cocked his head.  
“. . . But did Frodo ever kiss you on the forehead before night?”  
Bilbo shrugged. “Once in a while. Usually whenever he felt particularly lonely or bookish, the dear lad.” Bilbo nudged her and waggled his eyebrows. “Or if he’d been talking to you.”  
She froze, and a quick blush rose to her face, easily transitioning from standard gray to a rare purple.  
Bilbo grinned then. “Seville, he cares for you at least as much as he cares for me. And your attraction to him is no secret, leastwise for me. I understand.”  
She only blushed even darker. She didn’t entirely want to process what that entailed; it would be too much to ask for Frodo to be attracted to her, even if all evidence indicated so and she wanted it to be true. Bilbo chuckled. “He may need a good talking-to. He may not want to leave Rivendell, either.”  
“Then let us not depart!” she declared jocosely. She stood abruptly, and Bilbo’s gaze followed her. “We shall arise against our captors and remain in Rivendell!” She smirked as Bilbo laughed. She waved goodbye and walked back to Frodo’s room to think.


	16. And In the Darkness Burn Her

As Frodo roamed Rivendell, he found Sam standing against the end of a balcony overlooking the canyon river by the city. Sam muttered something about not forgetting anything.  
Frodo felt something tense deep down. He didn’t want to leave yet. “Packed already?”  
Sam straightened slightly, then shrugged. “No harm in being prepared.”  
“I thought you wanted to see the Elves, Sam,” Frodo responded, turning away.  
“I do!”  
“More than anything.”  
“I did! It’s just . . .” Sam sighed. “We did what Gandalf wanted, didn’t we? We brought the Ring this far to Rivendell, and I thought—well, seeing as how you’re on the mend, I thought we’d be off soon.” He paused. “Off home.”  
Frodo stilled, thinking about his conversation with Bilbo earlier, then reflecting for a brief moment on how going home would change him. He’d learned things about Sev, and now that the painful part had passed perhaps he could tighten their friendship. Going home meant he could change his life now, and it wouldn’t be half as difficult as the past few weeks had been. Besides, he missed the Shire.  
“You’re right, Sam.” He turned to face his gardener. “I am ready to go home.” He pulled out the Ring, pristine and perfect in his palm. “The Ring will be safe here in Rivendell.”  
After wandering about Rivendell a little more, Sam departed to eat again, at the Elves’ table but a little too close to the last meal for the Elves’ comfort. Frodo turned to go back to his room; he wondered if Sev would be there or if she had taken to prowling about the Elvish city.  
Before he opened the door to his chambers, Sev had already processed a great deal. She feared pursuing Frodo for the wound he possessed now. She feared exposure to it, anticipating that she would nearly kill him trying to get it. She shuddered, drawing into herself. That dancing chill of absolute, wicked pleasure up her arm, the flood of energy through her system . . . she couldn’t take it. She only hoped she would never have to lay eyes on his scar again. She banged her head against the wall behind her, resisting the hunger she had to grab him and drain that poison however she could.  
While she sorted that idea out, her thoughts turned back to Frodo. She sighed, sinking against her wall. He would never be the same. The light had not gone from his eyes, but pain and darkness left a slight, black glaze over them. Perhaps no one else could see it, but it had begun. She breathed a sigh of relief. Nothing else could claim him like the Morgul knife had. And if she tried to take the poison from him, if she ever hurt him, she swore to herself she would go drain herself of sustenance. Even if it meant leaving Frodo, although that last thought made her shudder.  
Frodo slipped inside, a little surprised to see Sev there. The dangerous light glimmering in her eyes stirred a little initial fear inside of him, until he saw the rest of her and he need not fear her; he loved her. He sat down on the bed, expecting her to join him. But she remained against the wall, a dark glare lacing her features.  
He cocked his head. “Sam’s packed,” he said. Her eyes flickered to him at last, widening when she snapped out of her thought train. She settled as she watched him.  
She still didn’t move to sit by him, so he decided to say it. “The wall is that comfortable?”  
“Better than standing up,” she replied in sarcastic jocosity. Frodo shook his head, patting the bed beside him. Sev nervously sat beside him, and warmth overwhelmed him. His dream came back to him when she settled under his arm, and he found his hand lifting a little to frame her face, bring her lips to his own as his other arm surrounded her shoulders. He fought it, and his hand dropped, defeated, into his lap.  
Sev sank into the mattress, biting back an exclamation of ecstasy. She’d never felt a mattress before. Frodo brought his arm from around her shoulders, and she flopped back with a great moan.  
“To Troneterra with a couch in the woods!” she cried, relishing the soft, white covers. “Glory to Rivendell and their angelic beds!”  
Frodo laughed outright. “So I’m the devil sleeping in the angelic bed?”  
Sev curled up behind him. “No. You can’t have it; it’s mine now. Get out of here, devil!” She shoved her hand over his eyes; her sudden warmth tingled against his Morgul stab, fighting it back. All too soon she pulled back for realization of what Frodo had said a few moments before. “Sam’s packed?”  
Frodo nodded, a little dizzy at her hand to his face. Now his wound rang through him with cold. “We’re leaving after Elrond’s council in three days,” he clarified.  
Sev set her jaw, and her eyebrows narrowed. “No! We are revolting. Leastwise, I am. You can go home if you want to, but I’m staying in Rivendell . . . with the Elves and their angelic beds . . .” She moaned again, curling into a little ball. Frodo ruffled her hair—but stopped, letting his hand linger against her warm forehead. Chills danced up his arm. He hadn’t kissed her forehead for some time, but now would not be the moment for that.  
Unless he explained to her how he felt. Then he could possibly even claim her lips, but he didn’t feel ready to say anything. His hand fell limp on the bed as he studied her face.  
Sev felt the moment growing too tense for her to tolerate. She slipped her gentle fingers about Frodo’s wrist—he shuddered slightly, almost wishing roughness would accompany jocosity for Sev—and picked it up, inspecting it. She dropped it suddenly back on the bed.  
“Yep. Dead. I figured.” She glanced up at him, humor dancing in her eyes. “We’d better amputate that, Frodo.”  
Frodo chuckled. “Wrong arm, Sev.” He limply shook his left arm. “And this one isn’t even entirely dead.”  
“Well, what if I licked it? Would it live?” She stretched out her tongue, then broke out laughing. Frodo did as well, and she clapped his shoulder as she stood.  
“Come; we must feed you something.” She extended a hand, and when he accepted it she pulled him to his feet. After so many years it felt actually somewhat initial, and so neither let go, walking side by side with their fingers entwined. Then Frodo registered that he no longer considered her just a friend, but someone he loved, and yet he didn’t want to let go now. Sev had gotten used to treating such a situation casually, feeling Frodo’s gentle fingers between her own, so although she stirred deep within she said nothing.  
But when they walked in to the Elvish dining hall, Pippin gawked, and Sev suddenly yanked her hand away. Frodo turned to her, a little surprised, until he saw Merry beginning to glance over as well. He sat down beside Sam while Sev took her place beside Merry. She wanted to sit with Frodo, but knew the consequences of doing it, particularly in front of the three other hobbits.  
The Elvish food laid out for them (courtesy of Pippin’s insistence that all meals of the day be honored in Rivendell) had a sweet aroma to it, and when Sev bit in she felt she would never stop. This appealed more than draining, but she held back. Frodo did not eat ravenously, but enjoyed the Elvish food.  
Pippin’s eyes rolled back with pleasure when he bit into a honeycrisp apple. He glanced at Sev, lifting up a small cake. He leaned over Merry to catch her attention.  
“You know, Sev, all you have to do to get any husband you want is cook like this.” He eyed the food in his hand intently, then dug right back into it.  
She laughed, feeling a little bitterness within but not letting it show. “Chances are excellent I would have to in order to have any shot at getting married.” Most at the table laughed, but Frodo felt a slight pang when Pippin brought up “husband,” and he didn’t understand why.  
Frodo glanced up at Sev, then laid a hand down on the table. “You’ll do fine, Sev.”  
She blinked, unsure how to take that, but she thanked him anyway and continued eating, for it made her feel a little better. A slight gray shade rose to her face when she wondered if he would ever think of it, but she shoved the notion aside. 13 years of being left to his own, and he had said nothing.  
Over the next two days, the hobbits gathered to eat and sing. Merry teased Sev for loving Frodo’s rich, high-register voice (which, when she heard it, caused her to stop singing and listen), but she blushed and refused to ratify or deny the accusation.  
Otherwise Sev and Frodo kept mostly to themselves, often walking about Rivendell together or reading, the latter factor being either together or separate. Whenever Frodo wanted to continued in Sev’s journal, he pulled back to himself. While Sev didn’t understand his isolation, she often had a need to be alone, and would go perch behind one of Rivendell’s waterfalls.  
The day before Elrond’s council, Frodo considered head-on what lingered in the back of his mind since Strider mentioned the Lay of Luthien . . . that being what more Sev would possibly do for him. He wondered if she would have carried the Ring; perhaps she would have been more capable, wouldn’t have succumbed to wearing it on Weathertop. She certainly seemed to despise it more than anything.  
He approached her when he could actually find her; she hid on the roof all morning, not ready to leave Rivendell. When she came down she saw Frodo; she knew he would go to the council. She had not been invited, but did intend to confront Elrond about the subject. She wanted to make sure no one did anything to Frodo in her absence.  
Sev barreled straight to find Elrond, but Frodo stopped her. He grabbed her shoulder and she halted, turning slightly. He didn’t understand the darkness in her eyes, why they were suddenly full of anxiety and thin patience.  
“Sev?”  
Sev settled, realizing as she relaxed that he’d lived after all they went through. She didn’t really want as much to stand up to Lord Elrond as she did just to feel Frodo’s fingers, or at least his presence.  
“What is it, Frodo?” she asked, turning to him.  
He hesitated, not ready to pull back. His thumb traced her shoulder slightly—then he shook his head and continued. Sev watched him, perplexed. “The Ring. Sev, would you have carried the Ring if I asked you to?”  
Sev’s eyebrows shot up. “Of course!” I would do anything you asked. She shook the latter answer off, then lowered her voice. “Of course I would have.”  
Frodo kept his hand on her shoulder and slipped his other one into his pocket, sliding the cold metal into his fingers. It pulled on him . . . but its pull to get to Sev grew stronger. He felt himself stepping closer to her, felt the Ring dragging him to her until she backed up against the wall, uncertain about what to do. She did not back away from his nearness, but from the Ring. Her heartbeat filled her ears, thudding painfully as the enticing little circlet of gold tugged at her, whispering and begging.  
Her breathing began to swell.  
“I feel like you would have been more capable of carrying it,” Frodo said finally, watching the little exchange between Sev and the Ring, unsure. But something about the Ring yearned to be with Sev, even if Frodo felt a little attached to it. He held it before her, his opposite arm up on the wall by her shoulder. Perhaps the Ring thought she would give in easily, but Frodo doubted she would. “Perhaps you ought to try now.”  
Sev shook her head slightly, feeling the strength of the Ring’s pull. While she loathed the thing with her very being, she couldn’t explain her need to snatch it from him. “I can’t,” she said under her breath. But then her eyes flickered open. She had to understand Frodo’s pain, had to understand what had happened to him. He didn’t look hurt at her response, but did back away. She grabbed his shoulder. “But if I can prove to you that I would have done it on your behalf, then I’ll do it now.”  
Frodo moved to give it to her, but her back met the wall again. Her eyes squeezed shut as he lifted her hand from her side and gently set the Ring down in the center of her soft palm. Sev flinched when the metal, now warmed by Frodo’s hand, touched her skin. He left her, stepped back to see if she would coax to it.  
Sev’s eyes squeezed open one by one, and she glanced at the Ring. She began to tremble—subsequently Frodo reached forward to take the Ring. But something whispered for him to stay back. He battled with his thought; this situation made him suspicious and shifty.  
But his fears quieted slightly when Sev’s eyes changed. She glanced at the Ring with interest. This seemed no attraction to the Ring’s power, rather an appreciation of the simple aesthetics—the unadulterated circle of smooth, shining gold—that quickly escalated. Her fingers wrapped around it, flicking it over and over in her hands. She set it back in her palm, feeling she had conquered it. She moved to give it back to Frodo, but suddenly the Ring knew she would give it up. It had to drain her blood, the dark power within her . . .  
Sev lurched. The Ring flamed against her skin. Her blood fought back, straining to take the Ring’s darkness—Sauron’s own soul—from it to feed her. Friction flared in her palm. The whispers of the Dark Lord swelled to loud hisses, filling the room with shadow. Frodo reached forward, but then the writing of fire carved into the Ring, and a flame erupted from Sev’s palm with the darkness she held. She cried out, and her fingers crushed over the Ring as she collapsed to the floor.  
“Sev!” Frodo knelt down beside her. The hisses vanished, and the room returned to its light state, but Sev continually grappled with the Ring on the floor. She writhed and groaned in horrible pain and struggle; she could feel herself losing. While she had taken bits and pieces of the Ring’s power, the Ring took more. The poison in her system drained to the will of the Ring. She cursed it over and over in her head as pain and weakness took over.  
Frodo grabbed her arms. Smoke ascended from her palm, but she resisted him, something deep within determined not to let him get hurt.  
“Sev! Sev, let go of the Ring!” He strained against her tight fold, but when he could do nothing else he grabbed her shoulders and stood her up. He flinched; the soft warmth of her skin had shot to scalding heat. He tightened his hold on her sleeves alone, shaking her. “Sev!”  
Hearing Frodo’s voice ebbed away at her battle. She yanked and pulled, determined to see him one last time before the Ring took her blood. She let out a gasp of a cry, and her hands flew away from the Ring. The little circlet of metal, defeated in its purposes but fed with a darkness that could easily revive its master, rolled away and clattered against the wall.  
Tears trickled initially down Sev’s face, and she scrambled away, slamming to the floor. She breathed heavily as she curled into a pained little ball. Frodo abandoned the Ring and knelt by her side. She began to inspect her palm but hurried to hide it when he approached.  
But he saw the black scar before she could conceal it: the Ring etched a perfect circle into her hand. It marked her as the Ring’s forever now, a brand of blackness and pain.  
“Sev . . .” Frodo grabbed her and held her close to him. She shuddered in his embrace. He laid a hand in her hair, tightened his hold. He promised himself never to let her touch the Ring again.  
Sev shook her head against his heart. She could hear his pulse echo against her ear. “I still would have carried it.” She bit back a whimper at the pain in her palm.  
Frodo lowered his hand and picked up hers with both of his own, releasing her body from his hold. She tried to back away, but he kept her hand (not really noticing her attempt to yank her hand back—she didn’t have strength for that) and inspected the scar. He traced the little circle, leaning closer to look at it. Sev inhaled sharply as pain shot up her arm, but she quickly relaxed at his tender touch.  
Frodo’s eyes flickered up to her face, but she didn’t look at him. So he felt a little safer to do what he wished. He barely brushed his lips to her scar, and she stiffened. The skin of her wound felt hot relative to the rest of her. He wanted to kiss it again and again, let her know he cared, but he couldn’t do it now. Perhaps, one day, he could.  
He brought her back into his arms, and she collapsed against him, finally allowing her tears to flow at the sharp pain in her hand.  
“Now you won’t have to,” he said in response to her statement of a moment ago. He waited a decently long time, long enough that she wondered when he would leave her to mourn alone. But she felt comfortable in his company, and as he remained longer and longer she felt her resolve failing. Her head collapsed into his lap, her legs tucked up against her. She thought about falling asleep, could have even with Frodo tracing her hair back from her face.  
After a good hour and a half, Sam came in to get them for dinner. Sev slipped away from Frodo, stepping over to the Ring. Frodo stood abruptly.  
“Sev.”  
She turned back to look at him. She’d wrapped her scarred hand in her cloak, but then thought the better of it and used her unscarred hand to reach down for the Ring. She glanced up.  
“I’ll get it,” he said. He followed her and picked up the Ring, now cold. It pulled for Sev, but Frodo yanked it back, stuffing it in his pocket. Sev followed it with her gaze, and a growl escaped her before she could stop it.  
Frodo reached for her hand. She hesitantly glanced down, wanting the comfort. She reached forward as well, and her fingers slipped into his. Her scar throbbed, and she winced. Frodo didn’t notice, but she didn’t want to let go. He walked her in to dinner.


	17. Puzzle

Once Frodo left for bed, Sev approached Lord Elrond. He stiffened when she came close, but then settled out of courtesy.  
“Seville.” He inclined his head.  
She bowed. “Lord Elrond.”  
“What dealings would you have with me, young Halfling?”  
She lifted an eyebrow, but said nothing. She cleared her expression and continued. “Sir, I wish to be present for the Council tomorrow.”  
Elrond’s eyes narrowed. “And where did you learn of this Council?”  
“Lord Elrond, I hope you will pardon my persistence, but I did not eavesdrop on any conversation, classified or otherwise,” Sev said somewhat darkly. “Frodo Baggins is my closest companion, and has not only entrusted me with information concerning the time, location, and purpose of the Council tomorrow, but many other things. I have been entrusted with his life by many, and I intend to fulfill my duties in caring for him if you will let me.” Sev inhaled slowly, and her eyes sank closed. Her fists clenched at her sides, and she sucked in a breath when one of her fingernails carved into her scar. Her eyes opened again. “Lord Elrond, if you do not permit me to approach the Council, rest assured I shall not be there. But I beg of you, give me a chance. I only ask for the opportunity to protect my charge and my friend.”  
Elrond frowned. “Seville, you are a creature of darkness. This Council comes with the purpose of destroying darkness.”  
“As though I have not desired or attempted to destroy myself,” Sev said gravely, containing her need to hiss. “I have, Lord Elrond. I know what a disgusting, dark thing I am and the danger I possess. I will do nothing at the Council but watch Frodo. I will even be in the bushes more silent than an Elf prince’s arrow if you wish it. Just let me protect him.”  
Elrond regarded her carefully. “If you must.” He waved a hand. “But if there is one movement from you to attack or influence anyone, you will not be permitted to stay.”  
She bowed. “Of course, Lord Elrond. I thank you for your consideration.” She wanted to defend herself, insist he did not know her character, her intentions, what she desired, what she loathed . . . whom she loved and wanted to protect above anything. She swallowed and backed away from the Elf. Black blood from her newly opened scar trickled down her arm; she buckled to hide the pain as she tried to walk, but she had to wait until it healed.  
She slipped back to the door before Frodo’s room. She heard him say her name, so she knocked. He didn’t respond; he didn’t know how to continue, and decided to feign sleep to avoid saying something he would regret in the morning.  
“Frodo?” she whispered, poking her head in. She could hear him breathing deeply when she listened. She smiled to herself. Still alive, still breathing. No harsh response from Elrond or anyone else could top the happiness she felt around Frodo. She glanced down at her scar, traced the little patch of skin that still tingled when she remembered the soft way his lips touched there. She held her hand to her heart; it may have been a scar, but it carried a positive permanence now as well.  
She backed out. “Good night, Frodo,” she whispered. “I love you.”  
The door closed behind her, and Frodo’s eyes eased open. He glanced tiredly into the darkness. “I love you too.”

Frodo awakened early, anxious for the Council of Elrond. Elves, dwarves, and men had come from all over Middle Earth for this gathering. Frodo did not anticipate saying very much, or learning very much, but Elrond still wanted him there.  
He opened the door and almost stepped on Sev’s sleeping form. He startled back, glancing down at her. He bent down and crouched against her. She still had her cloak; somehow she seemed more secure in it.  
Frodo let his hand rest on her shoulder, trace her arm. Her fingers were clutched tightly around her scar, hands entwined together. Frodo nimbly leaped over her, then cocked his head. He rested it on the ground close to hers. He brushed the swathes of hair from her face; she had such thick hair. He’d never seen it anything but down and wild, roaming like an untamed bush around her face and shoulders.  
She looked less sinister in her sleep. Frodo wondered at the stark blackness of her lips. He sighed, knowing to search her more would be to kiss her and awaken her that way. He reached forward and shook her shoulder. “Sev.”  
Sev’s eyes flickered open, and it surprised her to see Frodo there. She smiled.  
“Good morning.” Then she yawned, her eyes growing from exhausted to resistant. “It’s time to get up, Frodo,” she mumbled. Then her brow furrowed. “How long have you been out here?” She hoped he hadn’t been watching her for long. Well . . . on some level she hoped he had, but she didn’t anticipate it.  
Frodo shrugged. “Not long.”  
Sev moved to stand, but Frodo put a hand on her shoulder, laid her back down. “We don’t have to leave for some time. Pippin won’t be up for breakfast for an hour.”  
Sev frowned. “Why did you wake me up?” Then she smirked as she burrowed into the ground.  
“To put you back to sleep,” Frodo said, straining to his feet. Sev sat up.  
“Why do you get to stand up?”  
Frodo extended a hand, and she accepted it. He pulled her into the room, not minding to shut the door behind him. Sev preferred it that way.  
Frodo pulled aside the covers of the bed. “It’s yours, you know.”  
Sev gawked at him.  
Frodo held up his hands. “You kicked me out. It’s yours.”  
Sev slipped inside, moaning as she rolled around. Frodo laughed uncontrollably, and she shot a dizzy glare at him. She never could have imagined anything so comfortable—she didn’t understand why he laughed.  
“You can laugh,” she retorted, “but this is seriously—mmm . . .” Sev rolled about, burying her face in the pillow beside her. Frodo chuckled again and knelt beside the bed, fingering her hair a little bit.  
“Devil-friends give their friends beautiful things sometimes,” Sev mumbled into the white fabric, “but this is the most beautiful of all of them.”  
Frodo pondered that. She’d never had a bed in her life. No family, nothing. Frodo cocked his head. He’d given her a couch. Bag End had at least one spare mattress; he intended to give it to her when they got home. She wouldn’t come inside, but a full bed out on the lawn would probably please her quite well.  
Frodo watched her. She settled into sweet rest, breathing deeply. His brow creased; he hadn’t realized the effect such a gift would have on her. He sighed and sat back. If they ever stayed another night at Rivendell, he would insist she stay in the bed. He would sleep in the closet if necessary, or out on the floor where she had been.  
He rubbed his hand across her back. It hit him how much he cared for her.  
He let her alone until Merry burst in, excitedly announcing breakfast. He moved to leap on Sev and wake her up, but Frodo held him back.  
“Merry! Merry, I’ll wake her up! Merry!” Frodo shoved against his cousin, knowing Sev wouldn’t be too pleased. She likely wouldn’t more than glare, but Frodo knew how uncomfortable physical excitement made her.  
“Sev!” Merry called out. “Sev, wake up!”  
Sev’s eyes flickered open, and she turned over, stretching. She ran her hands down her waist to stretch her shoulders. “Good morning, Merry,” she yawned, raising her arms.  
“It’s time for breakfast, Sev!” Merry jostled through Frodo and leaped on Sev. Frodo heard her growl slightly, and he winced. She embraced Merry back, though, and he quickly leaped away to eat, clapping Frodo’s shoulder as he went.  
Sev sighed and sat up, her hair tousled. She liked Merry; he resonated with a flirtatious sort of cheer, but most hobbits had no physical bubble. Sev certainly did, and being pushed upon physically pained her. She folded her hands across her lap, then glanced up at Frodo with a weak smile. She winced as she rubbed against her shoulder. Her entire front ached, as did her cheek from where Merry had pressed his own against her. Her eyes clenched shut.  
“He wanted to wake you up that way,” Frodo said, sitting down beside her.  
Sev nodded. “Thank you, Sir Baggins.” She turned to him and fluttered her eyelids. “You saved me.” Then she cackled as his face turned bright pink. She nudged him, but did not pull back. He let his arm around her shoulders casually, but he didn’t take it as casually as the action had been.  
“Seriously, though,” she continued, “that wouldn’t exactly have been pleasant to wake up to.” She glanced at his shoulder. “It doesn’t hurt, does it?”  
Frodo frowned. “What are you talking about?”  
She blinked. “You aren’t hurt when you’re touched?”  
Frodo shook his head slowly. “I don’t understand.”  
“Pressure causes me to ache,” she replied. “I didn’t know most didn’t feel that.” She grabbed his hand and folded it over her arm, then pressed. Her eyes flickered with pain a few moments later, and Frodo pulled his hand back. He saw no mark on her, and he hadn’t felt as though his skin had gone very far into her.  
She rubbed the area where Frodo’s hand had been. “I know there’s nothing to show it,” she said, “and apparently there’s no reason for it. But somehow any level of real pressure hurts a little bit.” She bit her lip. “Pay it no mind, Frodo, you’ve never done it to me, really.”   
He pointed at her arm. “You’ve just broken my record.”  
She cackled wickedly. “Of course I did! It had to be done; you were never going to do it yourself!” Then she smiled up at him. “You’re cracked, you know.”  
He laughed. “Not until you told me.”  
She gawked, but she could tell he didn’t mean it. “I suppose the crazy don’t recognize it.” She clapped her hand over her heart. “Those of us who are sane, however . . .” She trailed off.  
“Sane?” Frodo laughed again.  
Sev sighed. “Ah, but you are right. I suppose I would only be your friend if you and I were both crazy . . . and both hungry.” Her eyes lit up. She stood and strode for the door.  
Frodo paused. “But you don’t need food.”  
Sev’s expression dropped to the ground. She didn’t remember telling him that, but decided she must have in order for him to know. People simply didn’t know these things. She turned back to him. “No. But you do.” She turned and continued walking, leaving Frodo a little perplexed on the bed.


End file.
